Tales from the Veld Part 25

"'What's this?' he says.

"'General,' I said, 'this boy has saved the regiment; he could a' run-- but he didn't.'

"'Who sounded the alarm?' he sed.

"'It was him, and the pa.s.s is full of Kaffirs.'

"The General stooped down, and looked into the little feller's face.

"'d.a.m.n you, man,' he said, turning on me; 'what did you take him into the wood for?'

"The little chap opened his eyes, and they were fixed, all glazed, on the General, and the officers stood around, looking, and the soldiers in the square.

"The General brought his hand to his cap, then he wheeled round: 'Ninety fourth--present--arms!'

"The ranks came to a salute, and the officers brought their heels together and their swords up.

"The little chap let his eyes scan the lines.

"'They are saluting you, my brave boy,' said the General.

"I felt him move in my arms, and I lifted his hand to his head to salute. Then he sighed, then he smiled, and his eyes closed. 'I'll wait for you, Abe,' he said, and he was dead.

"'Ninety-fourth,' said the General, 'the enemy's in the pa.s.s.'

"They came by in columns, and as they pa.s.sed, they looked at the little chap and saluted, and they went on in silence with their mouths shut.

"They clean frightened the Kaffirs that time; and next day--they buried the little chap--the band playing--and all the regiment in full dress.

My little chap--my little chap!" said Abe, in a whisper--"'I'll wait for you, Abe,' he sed. And when he sounds the bugle ole Abe'll go. Yes, I sit and listen for it." He sat still, looking toward the sea, and I went quietly away.

CHAPTER THIRTY TWO.

THE "RED" KAFFIRS!

I found Abe Pike one afternoon poring over a newspaper, tracing each word with a h.o.r.n.y finger, and laboriously spelling out the long words.

"Getting hints about pumpkin-growing, Abe?"

"No, sonny; jes' studying how to give spoon-food to infants, and you've come in time."

The old man looked vexed. He suddenly rolled the paper into a ball, and threw it at a lizard.

"It's mean!" he said; "danged mean!"

"What?"

He held out his hand, and I mechanically gave him my tobacco pouch.

"Ever been to England?" he said.

"Yes; you know I have."

"Soh! Is the people there white?"

"Of course!"

"Same as you and me?"

"A little whiter, I should say, Abe. What are you driving at?"

"Look here, sonny! I've been in this country, man an' boy, ever since I were born; and, you b'lieve me, I never get hole of a paper from the Ole Land but there's some abuse of us colonists. That's why I ask you is they white."

"What have they been saying now?"

"Saying; why the same old story--that we're a hard lot, always driving the Kaffirs, an' killing 'em, an' stealing their lands, an' 'busin'

their women-folk, and grindin' 'em down."

"Well; what does it matter!"

"It matters the hull sackful. Look at me--I've never been to England, but all the same it's my home. I love the ole flag, and cry 'Hurrah'

for the Queen; an', ole as I am, I'd boost anybody over the head as 'ud up an' say England was not the best and the biggest and the grandest country in the world. Yessir!"

"She's not very big, Abe."

"Soh! Well, she's big enough to spread her arms all round the yearth, and fetch anybody on the other side 'ker-blum' with a man-o'-war's big gun. We give her all--it ain't much, maybe--an' we get back a crop of suspicions. That's why I ask, is the people in the Ole Land white?"

"We are all of one family, Abe, and relations don't compliment each other."

"Who's crying out for compliments? I leave 'em to the chaps over in England, who praise each other to their face in the halls, and tell each other what fine fellows they are to save the Kaffirs from them cruel, savageous colonists. May the Lord look up and down 'em for the mischief they've done."

"You seem very bitter, Abe."

"Well, the reading in that paper has lef a bitter taste. You see, sonny, I recomember the wars of the 'thirties' and the 'forties,' when your father were a boy--and his uncles and brothers, and sisters and wives--the whole lot of us--were raw to the land--when the country all round were wild--and the Kaffirs hangin' on the frontier like a great dark wave way out on the sea--ready to rush in and sweep us offern the land. Three times they rushed in--three times we had to leave our homes, our flocks, our crops, and make for the posts. Then we had to fight 'em back, and those people away over in England each time 'ud fetch a howl that reached across the sea about the cruelty of the colonists--with never a word about the burnt houses, and the cattle swept off, and the women and children.

"Look here, sonny," said Abe, his face growing dark; "I'll tell you somethin' I seed when I was a grown boy--somethin' about one of these very wars the people at home have blamed us for making for our own gain.

"The Kaffirs were over yonder; about twenty miles away across the Chumie, and the farmers were scattered all about, thinkin' of nothin' at all but the mealie crop, and the wheat nearly ripe, and the pumpkin patches--for they had been through hard times, and the season were good.

Jes' away back of this place, where the three springs of the Kleinemonde rise out of the flats, there were a little valley no bigger'n ten acres, set around with small hills, and the water runnin'

through and round it under big yellerwood and Kaffir plum trees; while in the water stood clumps of palmeit and tree ferns, yeller and green, and rustlin' to the wind. Beyond the hills the gra.s.s veld rolled away to the Fish River bush, over here towards the Kaffirs, and the Kowie bush 'way back. On the gra.s.s veld were a many herd of bucks--springbok and blesbok--while in the thick bush were koodoo and buffel--ay, an'

elephant!

"It is a _mooi_ place now, that little valley; but I tell you then it were a spot to make a man look and long. But it were risky. The Fish River bush were a leetle too close, in case the Kaffirs raided.

"Howsomdever, there were one man who took the risk. He were ole Mr Tolver--a farmer from Devons.h.i.+re, and with him were seven sons--two on 'em born here, the rest away in the ole country. My gum! you should a seed 'em. The ole man hisself were not so big, though he were broad an'

deep; but four of his boys were over six feet, and the other three were growing fast. Ole Mr Tolver druv his stake into the little valley.

'This is my settlement,' he sez to the Government officer who came riding round, and tried to persuade him to give it up, because of its aloneness. 'Here I am,' he sez, 'and here I stays, and durn the Kaffirs!'