"Well, during the charge my old horse `Trumpeter' was killed, and I got a nasty fall, striking my head against a big stone. When I regained my feet our fellows were a hundred yards away, and before I well knew where I was, I was surrounded by a dozen Caffres, who would have quickly put an end to me had I not recognised Untsikana and called out to him to save my life. He at once interfered and would not let his men lay a finger upon me; but, in spite of my entreaties, he carried me off into the mountains. To make a long story short, I was kept, closely guarded, in a cave until yesterday morning, when Untsikana brought me on here." "Did the enemy capture any of the waggons?" asked Tom. "From what I heard them say, I think they must have got hold of the hospital stores waggon," answered Jamieson. "I saw three or four Caffres yesterday in a very miserable state, and Untsikana told me they had been drinking the white man's medicines. One fellow was terribly bad, and, from the condition of his mouth and lips, I should imagine that he must have been eating some sort of _blister_ [a fact]--and a precious strong sort, too!" "Hope it agreed with his complaint, whatever that may have been!" said Tom, grinning at the thought of the wretched Caffre's discomfiture when the blister began to draw. "But what could have induced the stupid beggar to taste such a thing?" "Don't you know that the Caffres have an idea that the white man's medicines possess extraordinary strength-giving properties?" his friend replied. "You're not half up in the manners and customs of your coloured compatriots. They will at any time steal physic in any shape or form, and swallow all they steal." "And did your friend Umpty go in for this course of promiscuous physicking? Though I don't suppose we should have found him so amiable if he had." "Well," laughed Frank Jamieson, producing a glass-stoppered bottle from his pocket, "while I was in the cave I saw Untsikana handling this, which no doubt he `looted' from the hospital waggon; and he was on the point of swallowing the contents, when, fortunately for him, I caught sight of the label and snatched the bottle from his hand." "Why, what is it?--castor-oil?" "Castor-oil!--no. He might have drenched himself with that for aught I should have cared," Frank answered. "This is _chloroform_--the stuff the surgeons use during operations to produce insensibility. It has only been in general use a few months, I believe." "Ah! I heard Dr Fraser talking to old McAlpine about it the other evening," said Tom. "This is the first time it has been supplied to the field-hospital. But what did you want to keep such dangerous stuff for?" he added. "There's enough of it to poison a troop, I should think." "To tell the truth, I popped the bottle in my pocket, and forgot that it was there until this moment. I must throw it away when I have a chance."