at I will explain.

Needless to say, in due course, as they were bound to do, those
complications arose, and under pressure of great physical and moral
excitement the truth came out. It happened thus.

Every reader of the history of the Cape Colony has heard of the great
Kaffir War of 1835. That war took place for the most part in the
districts of Albany and Somerset, so that we inhabitants of Cradock,
on the whole, suffered little. Therefore, with the natural optimism and
carelessness of danger of dwellers in wild places, we began to think
ourselves fairly safe from attack. Indeed, so we should have been, had
it not been for a foolish action on the part of Monsieur Leblanc.

It seems that on a certain Sunday, a day that I always spent at home
with my father, Monsieur Leblanc rode out alone to some hills about five
miles distant from Maraisfontein. He had often been cautioned that this
was an unsafe thing to do, but the truth is that the foolish man thought
he had found a rich copper mine in these hills, and was anxious that no
one should share his secret. Therefore, on Sundays, when there were
no lessons, and the Heer Marais was in the habit of celebrating family
prayers, which Leblanc disliked, it was customary for him to ride to
these hills and there collect geological specimens and locate the strike
of his copper vein. On this particular Sabbath, which was very hot,
after he had done whatever he intended to do, he dismounted from his
horse, a tame old beast. Leaving it loose, he partook of the meal he had
brought with him, which seems to have included a bottle of peach brandy
that induced slumber.

Waking up towards evening, he found that his horse had gone, and at once
jumped to the conclusion that it had been stolen by Kaffirs, although
in truth the animal had but strolled over a ridge in search of grass.
Running hither and thither to seek it, he presently crossed this ridge
and met the horse, apparently being led away by two of the Red Kaffirs,
who, as was usual, were armed with assegais. As a matter of fact these
men had found the beast, and, knowing well to whom it belonged, were
seeking its owner, whom, earlier in the day, they had seen upon the
hills, in order to restore it to him. This, however, never occurred
to the mind of Monsieur Leblanc, excited as it was by the fumes of the
peach brandy.

Lifting the double-barrelled gun he carried, he fired at the first
Kaffir, a young man who chanced to be the e