Frank Muller dismounted and came on to the verandah, and behind him crowded a dozen or more of his followers.
"What is it that you want, Frank Muller, that you come to my house with all these armed men ?" asked Silas Croft from his chair.
"I call upon you, Silas Croft, to surrender to take your trial as a land betrayer and a rebel against the Republic," was the answer.

"I am sorry," he added, with a bow towards Bessie, on whom his eyes had been fixed all the time, "to be obliged to take you prisoner in the presence of a lady, but my duty gives me no choice." "I do not know what you mean," said the old man.

"I am a subject of Queen Victoria and an Englishman.

How, then, can I be a rebel against any republic?
I am an Englishman, I say," he went on with rising anger, speaking so high that his powerful voice rang till every Boer there could hear it, "and I acknowledge the authority of no republics.

This is my house, and I order you to leave it.