Then they started again.
By eleven o'clock they reached an hotel, or wayside house, known as Ferguson's, situate about twenty miles from Pretoria.

It was empty, except for a couple of cats and a stray dog.

The inhabitants had evidently fled from the Boers.

Here John stabled and fed his horses, giving them all that remained of the forage; and then, once more, inspanned for the last stage.

The road was dreadful; and he knew that the country must be full of hostile Boers, but fortunately he met none.
It took him four hours to cover the twenty miles of ground; but it was not until he reached the _Poort_, or neck running into Pretoria, that he saw a vestige of a Boer.