"Roll out, Dibs. Roll out, you lazy beggar. It'll take us at least three hours." Thus Moseley, surveyor, to Tarrant, ditto. The campfire had gone out during the small hours, and the line of action enjoined upon the latter by his chum was not a congenial one, for the atmosphere half an hour before sunrise was chill and shivery. Yet, early as it was, the horses and pack-donkeys had already been turned out of the "scherm," or extemporised enclosure, in which they had spent the night, and were cropping the grass with an enjoyment born of the night's abstinence. "No hurry," returned he thus unceremoniously disturbed, rolling his rugs closer around him. "But there is hurry, Dibs, if we want to get to Hollingworth's by breakfast-time." "But _I_ don't want to get to Hollingworth's by breakfast-time, or any other time for the matter of that." "Oh yes, you do, once you're up. Come now, old man. Roll out." The two were old schoolfellows--hence the nickname which still stuck to one of them--and had met up-country by the merest chance, Moseley we have already seen, in the capacity of newly landed passenger from the English mail-steamer. Tarrant was a lean, dark man, with a pointed beard and a dry expression of countenance. He was inclined to take things easily, declaring that everything was bound to come right if only it were left alone. Moseley, on the other hand, was one of those painfully energetic persons, bursting with an all-pervading and utterly superfluous vitality. They had been out surveying claims, and were now on their return to Bulawayo. The night's camp had been pitched in a romantic glen, with nothing between the sleepers and the starry heaven but the spreading branches of a wild fig, nothing between them and Mother Earth but some cut grass and a rug. Stiff and cold, Tarrant rose from amid his blankets, and stood rubbing his eyes. "I'll never come out on survey with you again, Moseley," he declared. "You're a bore of the first water." "Won't you, old chap? I seem to have heard something of that sort before--often before." "I mean it this time. Er--Mafuta. _Tshetsha_ with that fire. _Tshetsha umlilo, Umfaan_. You savvy? _Tshetsha_!" Whether the native boy understood this adjuration in the dialect known as "kitchen Kafir" or not, he continued stolidly striving to blow into flame some ends of stick still smouldering from last night's blaze, it not seeming to occur to him that a couple of handfuls of dry grass would do the trick in as many seconds. The while the dialogue between his white masters continued. "Who the devil is Hollingworth when he's at home, Moseley?" "Down-country man, up here trying to farm. Served in the war against Lo Ben, and had ground given him. Rattling good chap. By the way, he's got rather a pretty wife." "Kids?" "Yes; three or four. I forget which."