I looked, and saw nothing.  Our sentries were posted outside, about a hundred yards apart, walking up and down till they met, and exchanging “All’s well” aloud at each meeting.

“They should have been stationary!” one of our scouts exclaimed, looking out at them.  “It’s easier for the Matabele to see them so, when they walk up and down, moving against the sky.  The Major ought to have posted them where it wouldn’t have been so simple for a Kaffir to see them and creep in between them!”

“Too late now, boys!” Colebrook burst out, with a rare effort of articulateness.  “Call back the sentries, Major!  The blacks have broken line!  Hold there!  They’re in upon us!”

Even as he spoke, I followed his eager pointing hand with my eyes, and just descried among the grass two gleaming objects, seen under the hollow of one of the waggons.  Two:  then two; then two again; and behind, whole pairs of them.  They looked like twin stars; but they were eyes, black eyes, reflecting the starlight and the red glare of the camp-fire.  They crept on tortuously in serpentine curves through the long, dry grasses.  I could feel, rather than see, that they were Matabele, crawling prone on their bellies, and trailing their snake-like way between the dark jungle.  Quick as thought, I raised my rifle and blazed away at the foremost.  So did several others.  But the Major shouted, angrily:  “Who fired?  Don’t shoot, boys, till you hear the word of command!  Back, sentries, to laager!  Not a shot till they’re safe inside!  You’ll hit your own people!”

Almost before he said it, the sentries darted back.  The Matabele, crouching on hands and knees in the long grass, had passed between them unseen.  A wild moment followed.  I can hardly describe it; the whole thing was so new to me, and took place so quickly.  Hordes of black human ants seemed to surge up all at once over and under the waggons.  Assegais whizzed through the air, or gleamed brandished around one.  Our men fell back to the centre of the laager, and formed themselves hastily under the Major’s orders.  Then a pause; a deadly fire.  Once, twice, thrice we volleyed.  The Matabele fell by dozens—­but they came on by hundreds.  As fast as we fired and mowed down one swarm, fresh swarms seemed to spring from the earth and stream over the waggons.  Others appeared to grow up almost beneath our feet as they wormed their way on their faces along the ground between the wheels, squirmed into the circle, and then rose suddenly, erect and naked, in front of us.  Meanwhile, they yelled and shouted, clashing their spears and shields.  The oxen bellowed.  The rifles volleyed.  It was a pandemonium of sound in an orgy of gloom.  Darkness, lurid flame, blood, wounds, death, horror!

Yet, in the midst of all this hubbub, I could not help admiring the cool military calm and self-control of our Major.  His voice rose clear above the confused tumult.  “Steady, boys, steady!  Don’t fire at random.  Pick each your likeliest man, and aim at him deliberately.  That’s right; easy—­easy!  Shoot at leisure, and don’t waste ammunition!”