d a curious picture. I heard the burghers jeer and
chaff him as he approached, and called out to him: "What on earth have
you been up to? It looks as if you had seen old Nick with a mask on."

The affrighted Boer's dishevelled hair stood on end and he shook with
fear.

He gasped: "Goodness gracious, General, I am nearly dead. I had gone
for a stroll to do a bit of hunting like, and had shot a lion who ran
away into some brushwood. I knew the animal had received a mortal
wound, and ran after it. But I could only see a yard or so ahead
through the thick undergrowth, and was following the bloodstained
track. Seeing the animal I put down my gun and was stepping over the
trunk of an old tree; but just as I put my foot down, lo! I saw a
terrible monster standing with one paw on the beast's chest. Oh, my
eye! I thought my last hour had come, for the lion looked so hard at
me, and he roared so awfully. By jove, General, if this had been an
Englishman I should just have "hands-upped," you bet! But I veered
round and went down bang on my nose. My rifle, my hat, my all, I
abandoned in that battle, and for all the riches of England, I would
not go back. General, you may punish me for losing my rifle, but I
won't go back to that place for anything or anybody."

I asked him what the lion had done then, but he knew nothing more.
Another burgher who stood by, remarked: "I think it was a dog this
chap saw. He came running up to me so terrified that he would not have
known his own mother. If I had asked him at that moment he would not
have been able to remember his own name."

The poor fellow was roused to indignation, and offered to go with the
whole commando and show them the lion's trail. But there was no time
for that, and the hero had a bad time of it, for everybody was teasing
and chaffing him, and henceforth he was called the "Terror of the
Vaal."

We should have liked to have lingered a few days near that splendid
and wholesome stream. We wanted a rest badly enough, but it was not
advisable on account of the fever, which is almost invariably the
penalty for sleeping near a river in the low veldt. One of the
regulations of our commando forbade the officers and men to spend the
night by the side of any water or low spot. It would also have been
fatal to the horses, for sickness amongst them and fever always
coincide. But they did not always keep to the letter of these
instructions. The burghers, especially those who had been