And, now I have reeled off this prosy prelude, let me tell you how it was I first heard of the exploits of the first band of English Lost Legionaries, who, although fighting for their own hand, made the English pioneers in Natal respected and feared by both Boer and savage, while the story also convinced your humble servant that, no matter how good he fancied himself and his lambs to be, still, in the near past, there were better and more daring men tailing on to the halyards of the Old Rag than either he individually or all his flock collectively were. And now let me trek. It was during the latter end of December 1878, just previous to the Zulu War, and forty years after the aforementioned incidents had occurred in Natal history, that I was trekking through the Thorn Country from Grey Town to Rourke's Drift, together with the staff of the 3rd N.N.C., and we were camped for the day on the banks of the Tugela River, when there arrived, at the same outspan, an old interior trader, trekking out of Zululand. Now, as I was particularly anxious to gain all the information I could about that country, I entered into conversation with him, and eventually he accepted my invitation to come over to my waggon, have some lunch and a yarn. Tiffin having been discussed and pipes lit we were chatting on the probabilities of the coming war when he noticed my M.H. sporting carbine and heavy B.L. revolver that my servant had just cleaned, and at once requested permission to examine them. After he had done so, and I had explained to him the mechanism of the carbine and the flatness of its trajectory in comparison with the sneider with which he himself was armed, he heaved a sigh, and handing back the weapon said: "Ah, if the first English army that invaded Zululand had been provided with such guns, instead of old flint muskets, they might have won the day." Smelling a yarn I replied: "I thought no English army had ever invaded Zululand up to date." My guest smole the pitying smile that an old-timer usually employs when a new chum exhibits his ignorance or puts his foot into it and queried: "Did you ever hear of Cane?" "Oh yes," quoth I; "if you mean the cockatoo agriculturist who had the first row with the boss of the original sheep-raising industry, I have heard of him." "No," responded my companion; "the party I allude to was no relation of his--did not even spell his name the same way, though both of them were handy with their dukes, and prone to go for their neighbours when riled. By the way, what is the strength of your invading force?" "Oh," said I, "about 6000 white men and an equal number of natives." "And I suppose," queried he, "all your white men are armed with M.H. rifles, and that you will take three or four batteries of artillery, rockets, etc., and that a percentage of your natives will be armed with rifles?" I nodded assent.