88 THE GREAT THIRST LAND. 



About midnight I stole forth to see that everything 

 was in order. It was a goodly night : the heavens were 

 without a cloud stars innumerable covered its whole 

 face. Beneath, a mile off, was a clear turbulent stream, 

 rushing headlong through a rugged rocky kloof, well 

 covered with stunted timber, while beyond stood out, 

 solemn and grand, their outline clearly defined against 

 the distant sky, some of the nearer spurs of the noble 

 Drackenberg range of mountains. But the foreground 

 I have said nothing of its tout ensemble was perfect. 

 The giant tent, white in the subdued light as that of 

 Croesus ; the fires with their smouldering heaps of glow- 

 ing coal ; the bullocks, with their legs beneath them, 

 quietly and measuredly chewing the cud, fastened by 

 twos and twos to their yokes ; and near where the Kaffirs 

 slept, within the radius of the glow coming from their 

 cooking-place, a dozen horses stood attached by reins to 

 their pickets. And naught broke the silence : not the 

 mournful note of the hyaena, not the merry whimpering 

 laugh of the jackal only the musical cowbell that 

 hung from Swartland's neck, and the deep and rapid 

 bass snore that announced that Holly was in the arms 

 of Morpheus. 



I would not for a very great deal have missed that 

 scene. I would that others could have seen it, but not 

 with me, for there are times when we wish to be alone. 

 Yet I am not quite alone, for as the thought is passing 

 through my mind, poor Bontebuck, a half-bred grey- 

 hound, and rapidly becoming a great favourite, put his 

 cold nose in my hand. Was the dog on foot too to 

 admire nature ? . or was it only affection for the master 

 whom already he recognised through little acts of kind- 

 ness to him? Both, possibly; for there is nothing 



