"'REVEREND HEER AND FRIEND QUATERMAIN,--I send this to bid you farewell,
for although you are English and we have quarrelled at times, I honour
you in my heart. Friend, now that we are starting, your warning words
lie on me like lead, I know not why. But what is done cannot be undone,
and I trust that all will come right. If not, it is because the Good
Lord wills it otherwise.'"


Here my father looked up and said: "When men suffer from their own
passion and folly, they always lay the blame on the back of Providence."

Then he went on, spelling out the letter:


"'I fear your boy Allan, who is a brave lad, as I have reason to know,
and honest, must think that I have treated him harshly and without
gratitude. But I have only done what I must do. True, Marie, who, like
her mother, is very strong and stubborn in mind, swears that she will
marry no one else; but soon Nature will make her forget all that,
especially as such a fine husband waits for her hand. So bid Allan
forget all about her also, and when he is old enough choose some English
girl. I have sworn a great oath before my God that he shall never marry
my daughter with my consent.

"'Friend, I write to ask you something because I trust you more than
these slim agents. Half the price, a very poor one, that I have for my
farm is still unpaid to me by Jacobus van der Merve, who remains behind
and buys up all our lands. It is #100 English, due this day year, and I