A Breath from the Veldt 309 



birds, and was oflF again to the camp, with Gentleman staggering under 

 the spoil. 



It is a big trek from Michelsfontein to Gong, and as we were doubtful 

 whether we could get the waggon through in one day, Oom Roelef rode off at 

 daybreak so as to reach his family the same afternoon, leaving me to follow 

 later on. It must have been about four o'clock in the afternoon when, 

 approaching the pools of Gong in expectation of seeing a few of the outlying 

 oxen feeding and the blue smoke of the camp fires curling heavenwards, I 

 noticed, to my surprise, that there were no fresh traces or sign of oxen having 

 been there recently, and as I got nearer and nearer the old place of outspan I 

 felt there was something wrong. Tante was not there, and as I slowly walked 

 my horse up to the deserted pools I saw nobody but the old man, who was 

 lying fast asleep against a log with his hat off, " to catch Heaven's blessed 

 breeze," while in his right hand he held a letter. Though I made some noise 

 in ofF-saddling and knee-haltering Brenke, the old hunter did not awake. He 

 was evidently wearied out, and I did not like to awake him, fearing that he had 

 had bad news ; so I sat and watched his beautiful features — never more strikingly 

 displayed than now — and in the course of half an hour I had finished the draw- 

 ing here reproduced. As the air grew chilly and darkness was coming on I 

 collected sticks and lit a fire, and shortly afterwards Oom Roelef awoke and 

 told me all. Several days after our departure a party of Matabele made their 

 appearance one morning, and told Tante that if she did not trek back to 

 Transvaal at once they would kill the whole lot of them. Hert and Piet had 

 fortunately returned to her, having arrived the previous day, and that evening 

 they made preparations for departure. Still no immediate danger was feared 

 till Hert, by chance, strolled over to the grass huts of some half-bred Basutos 

 only a short distance from the outspan and heard what had happened there. 

 At first he could find no one, but as he was going away a man whom he 

 recognised as the eldest of the natives came out of the bushes, and addressing him 

 in Zulu, told him that six of his people had been murdered by the Matabele, 

 he himself only just escaping death at the hands of a man whose assegai actually 

 penetrated the blanket in which he was sleeping. Hert soon saw enough to 

 prove the truth of the native's statements, and the following day, the family 

 trekked south to the Limpopo, there to await our coming. The letter held by 

 Van Staden had been stuck in a prominent place in a tree, and its contents set 

 our minds at rest for the present, though there was a chance of the Matabele 

 making it hot for us if they caught us there. 



