She was a woman apparently five or six and twenty years of age, though probably she was much less. She was not what might be termed a true specimen of the Boeress in Southern Africa, but was, in colonial parlance, an Africander, of French extraction, her father belonging to the race who established themselves at the Cape after the revocation of the edict of Nantes; and her mother, although the wife of a Boer, had a alight touch of dark blood in her veins. To these circumstances, which, in the eyes of the community to which she belonged, were objectionable, she owed her raven hair, drawn back from the temples, and bound round her head in classic fashion. The forehead was low, but well formed; the eyes long, dark, and fringed with black lashes, that softened their fiery expression; the nose aquiline, with the delicate nostril indicative of Indian blood; the mouth scarlet-lipped, and radiant with pearly teeth; her figure, above the middle height, and gracefully, if not perfectly, shaped, was set off by the dress, which, albeit coarse and rough, was picturesque; a petticoat of bright-coloured _voerchitz_, a bodice of the same material, but of different pattern, over which was thrown a rich silk handkerchief of orange hue--a gift from Cape Town; loose sleeves, reaching a little below the elbow of a beautiful arm; cotton stockings, passing fine, and _veldt scoons_, of better make than was common among her people, fitted to a tolerable foot and slender ankle. Such was the attire of Mrs, or, as she chose to call herself, Madame Vander Roey; and, as she came forward, the rays of the setting sun illuminated her figure, and set off the manifold hues of her costume in a very striking manner. Even the attention of the listless deserter was arrested by the vision of this showy dame, who, with a pistol in her belt, her arms folded across the orange handkerchief her head thrown back, and her flashing eyes bent eagerly on Lyle, awaited their approach in front of her rude but picturesque domicile. She opened the conversation by the direct inquiry addressed to Lyle in Dutch, of "Where do you come from, and what is your business?" Lyle replied, with equal decision of tone, "I am the trader from Umlala's Kraal; I have been, in communication with Vander Roey for more than six weeks." "Vander Roey has been absent nearly a month, but I did not wish Umlala's people to know this; the scouts were told he was ill, and have received the ammunition; some of it I have stored, some has been sent over the mountains. Are you here only as traders, and who is this boy?" She scanned the dejected-looking Gray with something like glances of contempt. "Doda, good morrow; you are to be trusted, because you would gain nothing by betraying us. Go, you will find meat cooking at those fires in the hollow. Who, I say, is this boy?" "A deserter from the service of my king," answered Gray, "and a miserable creature."