While I was wondering--and that with no little uneasiness--what on earth they could be doing there, suddenly I heard a wild cry to the right and left of me.

I glanced first one way, then the other.

From either side a great Zulu was bearing down on me, their broad stabbing assegais aloft, and black shields in their left hands.

The man to the right was about fifteen yards away, he to the left was not more than ten.

On they came, their fierce eyes almost starting out of their heads, and I felt, with a cold thrill of fear, that in another three seconds those broad "bangwans" might be buried in my vitals.