They spent two very pleasant days at Humpata, and then trekked. Before they left, Mevrouw Van der Merwe sent for Guy and Tom, and presented them with a quantity of dried fruits, peaches, quinces, and apricots. She added some of her precious apricot komfit, by which the Boers set much store. She had taken a great fancy to the two lads; they reminded her, she said, of two of her own sons, whom she had lost of fever at Debra and Vogel Pan on the trek thither. Guy and his cousin were perhaps not greatly flattered at being compared to Boer boys, for whom they cherished, like most English lads, a secret disdain. But the old lady was very kind, and they thanked her heartily for her gifts. They left her sawing through a big koodoo marrow bone with a hand saw. Her husband had lately come in from the veldt, and had brought her a quantity of _biltong_ (dried flesh) and this dainty, of which she was inordinately fond. "Farewell," she said again, pausing from her task and puffing hard for breath. "And, Tom, mind and tell your father once more to be on the lookout for Karl Engelbrecht. I am sorry they have had blows--though Karl was well served out, and your father was a right stark fellow to give him a thrashing. But Karl is a bitter bad enemy, and he will not forget. Be on the lookout, all of you, and if he comes troubling you"--here she lowered her voice to a tragic whisper--"don’t be afraid to shoot! Tell your father that, and say that is my last word--Karl is a _schepsel_ and a dangerous foe. Farewell." The various trophies lying about the Boer settlement and in the primitive habitations had greatly fired the ambition of the two cousins, who were now longing to reach the game veldt and begin shooting. At Humpata there had been indications of many kinds of wild animal: horns of buffalo, koodoo, roan antelope, water-buck, eland, and many other antelopes; and the hides of lions, giraffes, hippos, and other heavy game were abundant. Here, too, were tusks of elephant and hippopotamus, and the formidable horns of the black rhinoceros. It was manifest that they were on the outskirts of a wonderful game country. As the lads approached each day nearer to this land of wonder and of bliss, their spirits became more and more high, their suppressed excitement more uncontrollable. For three weeks Poeskop guided the expedition steadily towards the north-east. Then, one evening, as they sat round the camp fire, he came up to the group. "Baas," he said, pointing to the grim range of mountains which towered in front of them in massy outline, dim beneath the starlit sky, "to-morrow we shall pass the berg. Beyond is the game country, and the young baases will then have shooting to their hearts’ content."