Lifting his heavy assegai, he drove it through the man, so that he fell dead, and as he smote cried, "Coward, take this gift from the king!" Then, calling to the soldiers, he himself ran out upon the bridge of tree-trunks and leaped into the water that rose to his middle.

In an instant he would have been swept away, for the current was very fierce, had not those who followed sprang down at his side and behind him.

For a moment they managed to keep their feet till others came, giving them support and being themselves protected by a breakwater built of the men who had gone first.

Then, forming in a double line, each man linked his arms round the middle of his comrade in front, as Kaffir girls link themselves in a dance, and very slowly this human chain began to struggle forward along the back of the ridge.

At times, indeed, the weight of the stream was almost too much for them, and swept some of them off into the deep water which ran on either side, but the strong rope of human muscles held, and they were dragged back again.