Chapter XV. 



A MORNING AMBUSCADE ON 

 WITTEBERG. 



"XTTTHILST staying in Naroekas Poort we 

 \ \/ arranged, amongst other items of sports, 

 ~ to go overnight to the dwelhng of Tobias 

 Verwey, our host's Dutch foreman — who Hved in a 

 rude hartebeest-huis amid the mountains ^ — sleep 

 there for an hour or two, get up before dawn, and 

 make our way to a nek in the most secluded part of 

 the mountains, where the klipspringers and rheboks 

 were in the habit of passing, soon after sunrise, 

 from their night's drink at a fountain in one of the 

 deep kloofs below. Four of us, therefore, having 

 sent on a Kaffir with our blankets, rifles, and some 

 cartridges, took our shot guns, and in the afternoon 

 wended our way quietly along the mimosa valley, 

 and thence up the kloof that led to Tobias's. It 

 was a glorious day, one of those still afternoons 

 of late spring — warm, yet not too warm, for the 

 air was tempered by a crisp freshness, that later on 

 fades before the glowing heat of summer. 



We had calculated on a shot or two as we went 

 along, and were not disappointed. As a spring-haas 

 (jumping hare), that had issued from its shelter 

 somewhat earlier than is usual with these animals, 

 bounded away among the thorn trees to our right, 

 two guns rattled out, and over tumbled the hare. 

 Soon after we noticed, for the second time in our 



