ful beauty of the
scene was completed by its grand background of blue mountains.

A tall, powerful, middle-aged man, in a coarse cloth jacket, leathern
trousers or "crackers," and a broad-brimmed home-made hat, issued from
the chief dwelling-house as the horsemen galloped up and drew rein. The
sons of the family and a number of barking dogs also greeted them. Hans
and Considine sprang to the ground, while two or three of the eleven
brothers, of various ages--also in leathern crackers, but without coats
or hats--came forward, kicked the dogs, and led the horses away.

"Let me introduce a stranger, father, whom I have found--lost in the
karroo," said Hans.

"Welcome to Eden! Come in, come in," said Mynheer Conrad Marais
heartily, as he shook his visitor by the hand.

Considine suitably acknowledged the hospitable greeting and followed his
host into the principal room of his residence.

There was no hall or passage to the house. The visitor walked straight
off the veldt, or plain, into the drawing-room--if we may so style it.
The house door was also the drawing-room door, and it was divided
transversely into two halves, whereby an open window could at any moment
be formed by shutting the lower half of the door. There was no ceiling
to the room. You could see the ridge-pole and rafters by looking up
between the beams, on one of which latter a swallow--taking advantage of
the ever open door and the general hospitality of the family--had built
its nest. The six-foot sons almost touched the said nest with their
heads; as to the smaller youths it was beyond the reach of most of them,
but had it been otherwise no one would have disturbed the lively little
intruder.

The floor of the apartment was made of hard earth, without carpet. The
whitewashed walls were graced with various garments, as well as
implements and trophies of the chase.

From the beams hung joints of meat, masses of dried flesh, and various
kinds of game, large whips--termed sjamboks (pronounced _shamboks_)--
made of rhinoceros or hippopotamus hide, leopard and lion skins, ostrich
eggs and feathers, dried fruit, strings of onions, and other
miscellaneous objects; on the floor stood a large deal table, and chairs
of the same description--all home-made,--two waggon chests, a giant
churn, a large iron pot, several wooden pitchers hooped with brass, and
a side-table on which were a large brass-clasped Dutch Bible, a set of
Dutch tea-cups, an urn, and