I hesitated for a moment or two; then I made the great effort to play my part as I felt it ought to be acted, and stood alongside the black and close up to the wagon, between the wheels. Then taking a long breath, and wondering at myself the while, I stooped down so that my voice might go well beneath; but paused as I was about to speak, for I could hear in duplicate a deep guttural snore. At that moment Joeboy pinched my arm; and, drawing a deep breath, I growled out in the best imitation I could of the Boer Dutch: "Now then; rouse up, you lazy black beggars! Rouse up and trek!" My heart sank as the last word passed my lips. "Suppose they are not Kaffirs?" I thought. There was not a sound, and Joeboy again pinched my arm. I knew what he wanted; so, raising my voice, I said hoarsely, and in an angry tone: "Rouse up! Trek!" There was a loud rattling noise at the same moment, for Joeboy had reached under the wagon to strike here and there with the shaft of his assagai. In an instant, following a dull thud or two, there came low remonstrant growls, there was a scuffle and a rush, and two big figures rose near us; one Kaffir ran towards the front box of the wagon, and the feet of the other went _pat, pat_ till he stopped by the foremost pair of oxen in the team. Then the great beasts began to get upon their feet and shake themselves. "It's all over now," I thought, as I stood appalled by the noise made by the bullocks, one of them lowing loudly; and, as if my despair was not deep enough, I found from what I could hear that I had fired a train, started a conflagration, or--to use another simile--touched one end of a row of card houses and set all in motion. The action of rousing up the blacks asleep beneath this one had communicated itself from wagon to wagon on to the end. "Open sesame!" caused the cave of the Forty Thieves to open; the magic word "Trek!" had started the wagon-drivers and forelopers; and now I expected the next thing would be a rush of Boer cavalry to surround us, unless Joeboy and I could hide. "Yah! hor! whoo-oop! Trek!" cried Joeboy in his hoarsest voice, and he ran from me towards the foreloper, leaving me half-stunned at the turn matters had taken. "Trek!" cried the black, who had climbed on to the box; then there was a tremendous crack of the huge whip he wielded, the oxen jerked at the trek-tow, the wheels creaked, and as I involuntarily took my rifle from where it was slung and cocked it, the huge wagon began to lumber heavily through the soft earth, and I walked by its side uninterrupted, finding that in turn first one and then another of the six wagons started and followed, till the entire row were in motion, following the lead of Joeboy with the first foreloper, the whole business growing, in the darkness, more and more like a feverish dream. CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN. NIGHT WORK.