ith
rifle and revolver, made them a well-nigh insuperable barrier. No walls
are so hard to pierce as living walls. I thought of the penetrating
power of gold, and the sentries were sounded. They were incorruptible. I
seek not to deprive them of the credit, but the truth is that the
bribery market in the Transvaal has been spoiled by the millionaires. I
could not afford with my slender resources to insult them heavily
enough. So nothing remained but to break out in spite of them. With
another officer who may for the present--since he is still a
prisoner--remain nameless, I formed a scheme.

[Illustration: Plan of States Model Schools]

After anxious reflection and continual watching, it was discovered that
when the sentries near the offices walked about on their beats they were
at certain moments unable to see the top of a few yards of the wall. The
electric lights in the middle of the quadrangle brilliantly lighted the
whole place but cut off the sentries beyond them from looking at the
eastern wall, for from behind the lights all seemed darkness by
contrast. The first thing was therefore to pass the two sentries near
the offices. It was necessary to hit off the exact moment when both
their backs should be turned together. After the wall was scaled we
should be in the garden of the villa next door. There our plan came to
an end. Everything after this was vague and uncertain. How to get out of
the garden, how to pass unnoticed through the streets, how to evade the
patrols that surrounded the town, and above all how to cover the two
hundred and eighty miles to the Portuguese frontiers, were questions
which would arise at a later stage. All attempts to communicate with
friends outside had failed. We cherished the hope that with chocolate,
a little Kaffir knowledge, and a great deal of luck, we might march the
distance in a fortnight, buying mealies at the native kraals and lying
hidden by day. But it did not look a very promising prospect.

We determined to try on the night of the 11th of December, making up our
minds quite suddenly in the morning, for these things are best done on
the spur of the moment. I passed the afternoon in positive terror.
Nothing, since my schooldays, has ever disturbed me so much as this.
There is something appalling in the idea of stealing secretly off in the
night like a guilty thief. The fear of detection has a pang of its own.
Besides, we knew quite well that on occasion, even on excuse, th