wagon of
the king, and by the time they found his laager the Matabeles from the
other camps through which they had ridden had given the alarm. Through
the underbrush from every side the enemy, armed with assegai and
elephant guns, charged toward them and spread out to cut off their
retreat.

At a distance of about seven hundred yards from the camps there was
a giant ant-hill, and the patrol rode toward it. By the aid of the
lightning flashes they made their way through a dripping wood and over
soil which the rain had turned into thick black mud. When the party
drew rein at the ant-hill it was found that of the fourteen three were
missing. As the official scout of the patrol and the only one who could
see in the dark, Wilson ordered Burnham back to find them. Burnham said
he could do so only by feeling the hoof-prints in the mud and that he
would like some one with him to lead his pony. Wilson said he would lead
it. With his fingers Burnham followed the trail of the eleven horses to
where, at right angles, the hoof-prints of the three others separated
from it, and so came upon the three men. Still, with nothing but the mud
of the jungle to guide him, he brought them back to their comrades. It
was this feat that established his reputation among British, Boers, and
black men in South Africa.

Throughout the night the men of the patrol lay in the mud holding the
reins of their horses. In the jungle about them, they could hear the
enemy splashing through the mud, and the swishing sound of the branches
as they swept back into place. It was still raining. Just before
the dawn there came the sounds of voices and the welcome clatter of
accoutrements. The men of the patrol, believing the column had joined
them, sprang up rejoicing, but it was only a second patrol, under
Captain Borrow, who had been sent forward with twenty men as
re-enforcements. They had come in time to share in a glorious
immortality. No sooner had these men joined than the Kaffirs began the
attack; and the white men at once learned that they were trapped in a
complete circle of the enemy. Hidden by the trees, the Kaffirs fired
point-blank, and in a very little time half of Wilson's force was
killed or wounded. As the horses were shot down the men used them for
breastworks. There was no other shelter. Wilson called Burnham to him
and told him he must try and get through the lines of the enemy to
Forbes.

"Tell him to come up at once," he said; "we are near