e was five or six paces in front
of the other. This man shouted out loud and charged me, shield and spear
up. Now I had no shield--nothing but the assegai; but I was crafty and
he was overbold. On he came. I stood waiting for him till he drew back
the spear to stab me. Then suddenly I dropped to my knees and thrust
upward with all my strength, beneath the rim of his shield, and he
also thrust, but over me, his spear only cutting the flesh of my
shoulder--see! here is its scar; yes, to this day. And my assegai? Ah!
it went home; it ran through and through his middle. He rolled over and
over on the plain. The dust hid him; only I was now weaponless, for the
haft of my spear--it was but a light throwing assegai--broke in two,
leaving nothing but a little bit of stick in my hand. And the other one
was upon me. Then in the darkness I saw a light. I fell on to my hands
and knees and flung myself over sideways. My body struck the legs of the
man who was about to stab me, lifting his feet from beneath him. Down he
came heavily. Before he had touched the ground I was off it. His spear
had fallen from his hand. I stooped, seized it, and as he rose I stabbed
him through the back. It was all done in the shake of a leaf, my father;
in the shake of a leaf he also was dead. Then I ran, for I had no
stomach for the other two; my valour was gone.

About a hundred paces from me Baleka was staggering along with her arms
out like one who has drunk too much beer. By the time I caught her she
was some forty paces from the gate of the kraal. But then her strength
left her altogether. Yes! there she fell senseless, and I stood by her.
And there, too, I should have been killed, had not this chanced, since
the other two men, having stayed one instant by their dead fellows, came
on against me mad with rage. For at that moment the gate of the kraal
opened, and through it ran a party of soldiers dragging a prisoner by
the arms. After them walked a great man, who wore a leopard skin on
his shoulders, and was laughing, and with him were five or six ringed
councillors, and after them again came a company of warriors.

The soldiers saw that killing was going on, and ran up just as the
slayers reached us.

"Who are you?" they cried, "who day to kill at the gate of the
Elephant's kraal? Here the Elephant kills alone."

"We are of the children of Makedama," they answered, "and we follow
these evildoers who have done wickedness and murder in our kraal.