Some months later in the same year, when Troopers George Langley and Hiram Whitson also applied for ten days’ leave of absence,—­likewise to proceed to Pietermaritzburg,—­the leave was granted; but the officer in charge of the detachment laughingly remarked that he hoped they were not going to follow Dollond and Franks.

Now, neither Langley nor Whitson had the remotest idea of visiting Pietermaritzburg.  It is necessary, of course, for the reader to know where they did intend going to, and how the intention arose; but before doing this we must deal with some antecedent circumstances.

Langley was most certainly the most boyish-looking man in the force.  He had a perfectly smooth face, ruddy complexion, and fair hair.  He was of middle height, and was rather inclined to stoutness.  He was so fond of talking that his comrades nicknamed him “Magpie.”  A colonist by birth, he could speak the Kaffir language like a native.

Whitson was a sallow-faced, spare-built man of short stature, with dark-brown beard and hair, and piercing black eyes.  His age was about forty.  He had a wiry and terrier-like appearance.  A “down-East” Yankee, he had spent some years in Mexico, and then drifted to South Africa during the war period, which, it will be remembered, lasted from 1877 to 1882.  He had served in the Zulu war as a non-commissioned officer in one of the irregular cavalry corps, with some credit.  The fact of his being a man of extremely few words was enough to account for the friendship which existed between him and the garrulous Langley.  Whitson was known to be a dead shot with the revolver.

This is how they came to apply for leave:  One day Langley was strolling about just outside the lines, looking for somebody to talk to, when he noticed an apparently very old native man sitting on an ant-heap and regarding him somewhat intently.  This old native had been several times seen in the vicinity of the camp, but he never seemed to speak to any one, and he looked so harmless that the police did not even trouble to ask him for the written pass which all natives are obliged by law to carry when they move about the country.  The old man saluted Langley and asked in his own language for a pipeful of tobacco.  Langley always carried some loose leaves broken up in his pocket, so he at once pulled some of these out and half filled the claw-like hand outstretched to receive them.  The old native was voluble in his thanks.  There was a large ant-heap close to the one on which he had been sitting, and on which he reseated himself while filling his pipe.  Against this Langley leaned and took a good look at his companion.  The man had a most extraordinary face.  His lower jaw and cheek-bones were largely developed, but Langley hardly noticed this, so struck was he with the strange formation of the upper jaw.  That portion of the superior maxillary bone which lies between the sockets of the eye-teeth protruded, with the sockets, to a remarkable degree, and instead of being curved appeared to be quite straight.  The incisor teeth were very large and white, but it was the development of the eye-teeth that was most startling.  These, besides being very massive, were produced below the level of the incisors to a depth of nearly a quarter of an inch.  They distinctly suggested to Langley the tusks of a baboon.