A HOTTENTOT PATRIOT. 32 I 



Frequent and protracted wanderings in the 

 interior of Africa had long enabled me to do without 

 a guide ; but it was not a guide I wanted now, but 

 an advance guard to prevent me coming in contact 

 with persons of any description whatever, till I was 

 through the dangerous locality, and if I had searched 

 the world over, I could not have found another 

 person so suited for this purpose, as my tried and 

 faithful old friend Cigar. 



The earnestness of his greeting on meeting me, 

 and the manifest pleasure he exhibited at being 

 once more my companion, told me, as plainly as 

 words could say, that in my absence I had not been 

 forgotten, and that time had not one iota diminished 

 his regard for his old employer. 



By day and night he hovered about me, in fact 

 his attentions in this way were at times somewhat 

 troublesome ; but woe betide the man who treated 

 me with lack of courtesy, or dared to raise his hand 

 against me, if my friend was present. Several 

 times I had appointed a date for my departure, but 

 insuperable delays forced me to postpone it. At 

 length I decided, whether my business was settled 

 or not, to leave the day after to-morrow. 



The evening I came to that resolve, soon after 

 midnight Cigar paid me a visit. His object for 

 doing so was to inform me that a party of marauders 

 had made up their minds to waylay me near a kloof, 

 about thirty miles distant, when, to simplify matters 



Y 



