add to its beauty. For the old line, "Nature unadorned adorned the
most," still remains true in more senses than one.

Presently his reflections were interrupted by the step of Silas
Croft, which, notwithstanding his age and bent frame, still rang firm
enough--and he turned to greet him.

"Well, Captain Niel," said the old man, "up already! It looks well if
you mean to take to farming. Yes, it's a pretty view, and a pretty place
too. Well, I made it. Twenty-five years ago I rode up here and saw this
spot. Look, you see that rock there behind the house? I slept under it
and woke at sunrise and looked out at this beautiful scene and at the
great veldt (it was all alive with game then), and I said to myself,
'Silas, for five-and-twenty years have you wandered about this great
country, and now you are getting tired of it; you've never seen a fairer
spot than this or a healthier; be a wise man and stop here.' And so I
did. I bought the 3,000 _morgen_ (6,000 acres), more or less, for 10
pounds down and a case of gin, and I set to work to make this place, and
you see I have made it. Ay, it has grown under my hand, every stone and
tree of it, and you know what that means in a new country. But one way
or another I have done it, and now I have grown too old to manage it,
and that's how I came to give out that I wanted a partner, as Mr. Snow
told you down in Durban. You see, I told Snow it must be a gentleman; I
don't care much about the money, I'll take a thousand for a third share
if I can get a gentleman--none of your Boers or mean whites for me. I
tell you I have had enough of Boers and their ways; the best day of my
life was when old Shepstone ran up the Union Jack there in Pretoria and
I could call myself an Englishman once more. Lord! and to think that
there are men who are subjects of the Queen and want to be subjects of
a Republic again--Mad! Captain Niel, I tell you, quite mad! However,