was evidently the practice of the household to retire early, so I went to my room at once. It was large and lofty. The snowy linen upon the great feather-bed looked tempting, and I felt a deep sense of satisfaction in sinking into the downy abyss.
My window looked out upon the valley; through the wide-open casement I could see the black rampart of mountain crested with twinkling stars. Here, if anywhere, one could realise—
“The silence that is in the starry sky,
And sleep that is among the lonely hills.”
Shortly after daylight a most delicious cup of coffee was brought to my bedside; it was keen enjoyment just to lie and inhale the aroma, but the aroma was nothing to the taste.
Soon a weak shaft of sunlight touched the wall above my head, so I sprang up and went to the open window. The beauty of the scene was incomparable. To the southward arose the stark, rugged mountain mass which formed the culmination of the range—its topmost crags touched with gold; all else was clothed in a diaphanous purple veil; every hollow was brimming with mystery. Here and there a faint wreath of mist clung like departing sleep to the eyelids of the mountain. As I looked, the sun climbed through a gap, and straightway the lesser summits grew golden.
Not a breath of the slightest breeze disturbed the sacred stillness. The only sound was the faint murmur from the distant stream foaming over the grey boulders at the bottom of the valley. From the stream the hillside sloped steeply up, dotted thickly with dark green trees. But an undercurrent of very real sadness flowed through all this beauty. I could not forget the blind man in the next room; did he ever recall this scene—which he must often have gazed upon—and repine? Although his peace seemed to be as deep and changeless as the vault of the blue sky, the memory must, surely, often strain his heartstrings.
I leant upon the window-sill and looked to the right. There I saw Gertrude standing, her dead-gold hair unbound, her pure, calm visage bathed in the sunlight. She appeared to gaze at the sun as unconcernedly as an eagle might have done. She afforded the one touch necessary to complete the harmony of the scene.
After an early breakfast I took my rifle and, accompanied by the Hottentot guide, went forth in search of game. The mountain was so steep that our ponies could only ascend by scarping, zigzag fashion. It took nearly two hours to reach the central plateau lying between the two highest summits of the range.
From here the view was superb; billow after billow seemed to surge away in every direction—each crested with a fringe of cliff like the foam of a breaking wave. Every now and then a faint cloud-wreath would form around one or other of the higher crags, then float away to leeward like a tress, until dissolved by the sunshine.
Having shot a couple of rheboks, I felt disinclined for further slaughter, so laid myself down among the late mountain flowers and basked in the light. The heat was deliciously tempered by a steadily-streaming breeze. Thus were spent several hours.
It was only when the sun had sunk considerably in to the afternoon that I regretfully began to think of returning to the homestead. The ponies were grazing a short distance away, so after telling my after-rider to replace the saddles, load up the game and make his way homeward by the nearest available course, I took a bee-line on foot for the farmhouse.
My course led across the head of a gorge, the sides of which were steep, grassy slopes, interspersed with patches of moraine. Here and there immense angular fragments of stone—which had, ages back, slid down from the crowning cliffs—protruded from the earth. Passing one of these, something peculiar in its appearance caught my eye, so I approached more closely. Upon its flat face the following inscription had been roughly cut:—
“HIER WORDT EEN ZONDENAAR BEKEERD.”
Having thought much of old Sarei during the day, I involuntarily connected him with the strange inscription—“Here a sinner became converted.” The letters were deeply carved into the stone, and the way the dents were overgrown with lichen showed that the carving had taken place many years ago. Somehow the legend seemed quite congruous; if a special revelation ever came from the Divine to the human, what place could be more appropriate for its happening than this—the undefiled heart of the everlasting hills, where the hand of man had as yet wrought no desecration? Like Moses before the Burning Bush, I felt as though standing upon holy ground.
I reached the homestead just as dusk was setting in. After supper I again went to pay my respects to old Sarei. He greeted me with cheerfulness—
“Well, they say no Englishman can shoot, yet I hear you killed two bucks to-day.”
“Yes,” I replied, “I killed two bucks, and I almost wish I had not done so. It seemed to be a sin to shed blood in such a place and on such a day.”
Old Sarei turned his mild, inquiring, blind eyes upon me, but made no reply. We sat and smoked in silence for a while.
“Can you tell me anything about an inscription I saw upon a rock to-day—‘Here a sinner became converted’?”
“Yes,” he replied, after a pause, “I am the sinner. My son cut the words upon the stone at my wish.”
I held silence, so he shortly afterwards asked—“Would you like me to tell you of what happened?”
“Yes, I should be most grateful.”
“I was born on this farm,” he said; “my father was one of the first to take up land about here. When a young man, hunting was my passion. I made friends with the wild Bushmen who then dwelt on the mountain, and they used to drive the game for me. I built a hut near the spring just below the summit, and there I sometimes stayed for weeks together.
“I was proud of my eyesight and my skill with the rifle. I did not care for the society of others; I neglected my wife and children; I neither feared God nor regarded man. The mountain I looked upon as my home. Living so near the sky makes one different to others. The sins of the Flesh lose their breath and cannot climb so high, but those of the Spirit beset you sorely. You will remember that Satan tempted the Lord on the top of a high mountain.
“One day in summer, about forty years ago, I was riding across the head of the kloof where the stone stands whereon you read those words to-day. A thunderstorm was sweeping down from the north-west, but I took no heed, for I had never known fear of lightning nor anything else. The Bushmen were driving on a troop of elands, and I expected them to cross the saddle at the head of the kloof; so I left the horse concealed in a hollow and took my stand, with the rifle on my arm, at the foot of the rock.
“Soon the elands appeared; they ran for a short distance down the kloof, then halted just opposite where I was standing. One great bull stood apart from the others. As I lifted my rifle to take aim a flash leaped out of the cloud and struck the ground close to where the bull was standing, igniting the grass. The animal sprang back in terror. I fired—and it rolled over, dead.
“Then I laughed aloud and shouted that my aim was more true than that of the Almighty. An instant afterwards the heavens opened and flame enveloped me like a sheet. I fell, senseless, to the ground.
“When I recovered I thought night had fallen. I could smell that my clothing was scorched, but I felt no hurt. The rain had ceased and I was conscious of a sensation of warmth. I still thought it was night, but night blacker than I had ever known. After a while I stood up and groped about in terror, for I now imagined that the end of the world had come and that the sun had been quenched. Then I heard a bird singing: I still wondered; but when I heard the Bushmen calling to me from the other side
