"Yes, a good meal does make a difference," I said, smiling with pleasant recollections of my own breakfast. "Difference! Oh, it was splendid! I felt as if I could have voted for you to be made colonel on the spot, and black Joeboy adjutant, when I caught sight of you coming with six wagons and teams instead of one. My dear boy, you've won the affection of every one in the corps, from the Colonel right down to the cooks. It's only cupboard-love, of course; but they're very fond of you now. We were going to chair you round the big court last night, but the Colonel stopped it. `Let the poor fellow have a good rest,' he said. But we did all drink your health with three times three--in water. Here--hullo! What game do you call that?" He pointed to where, half a mile away, a dozen of our men were riding out, closely followed by the bullocks we had captured overnight. "Taking the teams out to graze, I suppose. The poor beasts must be well fed to keep them in condition." "Of course. But how do we know that they won't all bolt back for the Boers' camp? They're Boer bullocks, you know. Oh! I'll never forgive the Colonel if he loses all that beef." "The poor brutes will only make for the nearest patches of grass and bush," I said, "and their guard will take care to head them back if they seem disposed to stray." "But is any one on the lookout with a glass on the wall?" "Sure to be," I said. "I'm not so sure," cried Denham impatiently. "Why, there must be going on for six hundred sirloins there, without counting other tit-bits; and if the bullocks are taken care of, each one is a sort of walking safe full of prime meat for the troops." "There--look!" I said; "they're settling down to graze, and the guard is spreading out between them and the open veldt." "Yes, I see," said Denham anxiously; "but I hope they'll take great care. That job ought to be ours." But it was not, and I did not want it. I said so, too. "That's bosh," replied Denham. "You say so because you're not hungry; but just wait till you are, and then you'll be as fidgety about the bullocks as I am." "But you're not hungry now," I said laughingly. "Well, no--not at present; but I shall be soon. I haven't made up the balance of two days' loss yet. Ugh! only fancy--grilled cat's-meat for a commissioned officer in Her Majesty's service! Ugh! To think that I was compelled by sheer hunger to eat horse! I'd swear off all flesh-feeding for good if it wasn't for that beef." He burst into a hearty fit of laughing then, and we rode on, chatting about our position and the fact that the Boers seemed to consider they could not do better for their side than keep us shut up as we were till we surrendered as prisoners of war. "That's it, evidently," said Denham. "They hate us horribly, for we'd been doing a lot of mischief amongst them before you joined, as well as ever since." "Shall we be able to cut our way through before long?" I asked.