Well, this was not much of a commencement; and very disheartened we were, so disheartened that Tom spoke of going back to England and getting a clerkship. For you see we didn’t know that we had played out all our small cards, and that the trumps were going to turn up. No; we thought our “hands” were bad all through. It was a very lonely part of the country that we were in, inhabited by a few scattered farms, whose houses were stockaded and fenced in to defend them against the Kaffirs. Tom Donahue and I had a little hut right out in the bush; but we were known to possess nothing, and to be handy with our revolvers, so we had little to fear. There we waited, doing odd jobs, and hoping that something would turn up. Well, after we had been there about a month something did turn up upon a certain night, something which was the making of both of us; and it’s about that night, sir, that I’m going to tell you. I remember it well. The wind was howling past our cabin, and the rain threatened to burst in our rude window. We had a great wood fire crackling and sputtering on the hearth, by which I was sitting mending a whip, while Tom was lying in his bunk groaning disconsolately at the chance which had led him to such a place. “Cheer up, Tom--cheer up,” said I. “No man ever knows what may be awaiting him.” “Ill luck, ill luck, Jack,” he answered. “I always was an unlucky dog. Here have I been three years in this abominable country; and I see lads fresh from England jingling the money in their pockets, while I am as poor as when I landed. Ah, Jack, if you want to keep your head above water, old friend, you must try your fortune away from me.” “Nonsense, Tom; you’re down in your luck to-night. But hark! Here’s some one coming outside. Dick Wharton, by the tread; he’ll rouse you, if any man can.” Even as I spoke the door was flung open, and honest Dick Wharton, with the water pouring from him, stepped in, his hearty red face looming through the haze like a harvest-moon. He shook himself, and after greeting us sat down by the fire to warm himself. “Where away, Dick, on such a night as this?” said I. “You’ll find the rheumatism a worse foe than the Kaffirs, unless you keep more regular hours.” Dick was looking unusually serious, almost frightened, one would say, if one did not know the man. “Had to go,” he replied--“had to go. One of Madison’s cattle was seen straying down Sasassa Valley, and of course none of our blacks would go down _that_ valley at night; and if we had waited till morning, the brute would have been in Kaffirland.” “Why wouldn’t they go down Sasassa Valley at night?” asked Tom. “Kaffirs, I suppose,” said I. “Ghosts,” said Dick. We both laughed. “I suppose they didn’t give such a matter-of-fact fellow as you a sight of their charms?” said Tom, from the bunk. “Yes,” said Dick, seriously, “yes; I saw what the niggers talk about; and I promise you, lads, I don’t want ever to see it again.”