I dreamed all sorts of dreams, rather pleasant dreams on the whole.  Then I woke up by degrees to find myself in an earthen pit shaped like a bottle and having the remains of polished sides to it.  It made me think of Joseph who was let down by his brethren into a well in the desert.  Now, who on earth could have let me down into a well, especially as I had no brethren?  Perhaps I was not really in a well.  Perhaps this was a nightmare.  Or I might be dead.  I began to remember that there were certain good reasons why I should be dead.  Only, only—­why should they have buried me in woman’s clothes as I seemed to wear?

And what was that noise that had wakened me?

It could not be the trump of doom, unless the trumping of doom went off like a double-barrelled gun.

I began to try to climb out of my hole, but as it was nine feet deep and bottle-shaped, which the light flowing in from the neck showed, I found this impossible.  Just as I was giving up the attempt, a yellow face appeared in that neck, which looked to me like the face of Hans, and an arm was projected downwards.

“Jump, if you are awake, baas,” said a voice—­surely it was the voice of Hans—­“and I will pull you out.”

So I jumped, and caught the arm above the wrist.  Then the owner of the arm pulled desperately, and the end of it was that I succeeded in gripping the edge of the bottle-like hole, and, with the help of the arm, in dragging myself out.

“Now, baas,” said Hans, for it was Hans, “run, run before the Boers catch you.”

“What Boers?” I asked, sleepily; “and how can I run with these things flapping about my legs?”

Then I looked about me, and, although the dawn was only just breaking, began to recognise my surroundings.  Surely this was the Prinsloos’ house to my right, and that, faintly seen through the mist about a hundred paces away, was Marie’s and my own.  There seemed to be something going on yonder which excited my awakening curiosity.  I could see figures moving in an unusual manner, and desired to know what they were doing.  I began to walk towards them, and Hans, for his part, began to try to drag me in an opposite direction, uttering all sorts of gibberish as to the necessity of my running away.  But I would not be dragged; indeed, I struck at him, until at last, with an exclamation of despair, he let go of me and vanished.

So I went on alone.  I came to my house, or what I thought resembled it, and there saw a figure lying on its face on the ground some ten or fifteen yards to the right of the doorway, and noted abstractedly that it was dressed in my clothes.  The Vrouw Prinsloo, in her absurd night garments, was waddling towards the figure, and a little way off stood Hernan Pereira, apparently in the act of reloading a double-barrelled gun.  Beyond, staring at him, stood the lantern-faced Henri Marais, pulling at his long beard with one hand and holding a rifle in the other.  Behind were two saddled horses in the charge of a raw Kaffir, who looked on stupidly.