well-known Boer family of that name, the most of whom lived in the
Graafreinet district in the Old Colony till some of them trekked into
the Transkei, when I was still a young girl, to be as far as they could
from the heart of the British power. Nor did they trek for a little
reason. Listen and judge.

One of the Bezuidenhouts, Frederick, was accused of treating some
black slave of his cruelly, and a body of the accursed _Pandours_,
the Hottentots whom the English had made into a regiment, were sent to
arrest him. He would not suffer that these black creatures should lay
hands upon a Boer, so he fled to a cave and fought there till he was
shot dead. Over his open grave his brethren and friends swore to take
vengeance for his murder, and fifty of them raised an insurrection. They
were pursued by the _Pandours_ and by burghers more law abiding or more
cautious, till Jan Bezuidenhout, the brother of Frederick, was shot
also, fighting to the last while his wife and little son loaded the
rifles. Then the rest were captured and put upon their trial, and to the
rage and horror of all their countrymen the brutal British governor of
that day, who was named Somerset, ordered five of them to be hanged,
among them my husband's father and uncle. Petitions for mercy availed
nothing, and these five were tied to a beam like Kaffir dogs yonder at
Slagter's Nek, they who had shed the blood of no man. Yes, yes, it is
true, for Jan, my man, saw it; he saw his father and his uncle hanged
like dogs. When they pushed them from the beam four of the ropes
broke--perhaps they had been tampered with, I know not--but still the
devils who murdered them would show no mercy. Jan ran to his father and
cast his arms about him, but they tore him away.

"Do not forget, my son," he gasped as he lay there on the ground with
the broken rope about his neck, nor did Jan ever forget.