Meanwhile he practised the fighting-men in aiming and sighting and fire discipline, giving his commands by means of the whistle borrowed from the German sergeant. These exercises were performed, not only in the nullah, but on the ground cleared in front of the barricade and also in the forest. His stock of ammunition would not allow of much target practice, and he ruefully owned that the greater part of the men could not be expected to become good marksmen. It was more profitable to spend time in giving them cohesion in simple field movements. He divided them into sections of sixteen, and got up sham fights in the forest: one party advancing, the other retiring. At first the men whose part it was to retire refused to do so, and even came to blows with the attackers: why should they withdraw before men no better than themselves? But after a time they entered into the spirit of the game, and showed considerable aptitude. Tom found the askaris useful in the course of his various exercises. At first, when he practised his men in the nullah, the askaris looked on with disdain, and roared with laughter at the mistakes made by the negroes. But by degrees they grew interested; they commented among themselves on the contrast between the Englishman’s patience and good temper and the rough treatment they had suffered at the hands of their German drill sergeants. Tom, though he affected to disregard them, was all the time keenly watching, and there came a moment when he suddenly turned to them and asked for two volunteers to show the Wahehe the correct way of kneeling to take aim. As he had expected, they were flattered; every man wished to serve as a model. For some days he did not apply to them again, and noticed a certain restlessness and disappointment among them. At length he allowed them to act regularly as guides and markers, but did not admit them definitively to the ranks of his fighting-men until they came to him in a body and begged to be taken fully into his service. They were Sudanese, like the majority of the German native troops. Many of their people were fighting in the British ranks: they preferred his drill to the German; and they were ready to vow fidelity to him. "What about pay?" asked Tom. "I have no money." They replied that in the nullah they had no use for pay, but no doubt he would pay them when he had the money--an English promise was good. Tom was rather doubtful of the wisdom of trusting men who so suddenly changed their allegiance, and he suspected that at the slightest set-back they would desert him. On the other hand, these trained men might serve as good stiffening for his untried troops, and ultimately he decided to incorporate them with the garrison of the nullah, but not to allow them to leave it until he had some clear proof of their loyalty.