



Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England




John Ames, Native Commissioner, by Bertram Mitford.

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JOHN AMES, NATIVE COMMISSIONER, BY BERTRAM MITFORD.



CHAPTER ONE.

MADULA'S CATTLE.

Madula's kraal, in the Sikumbutana, was in a state of quite unusual
excitement.

The kraal, a large one, surrounded by an oval ring-fence of thorn,
contained some seventy or eighty huts.  Three or four smaller kraals
were dotted around within a mile of it, and the whole lay in a wide,
open basin sparsely grown with mimosa and low scrub, shut in by
round-topped acacia-grown hills bearing up against the sky-line at no
great distance.

The time was towards evening, usually the busy time of the day, for then
it was that the cattle were driven in for milking.  But now, although
the sun was within an hour of the western horizon, no lowing herds could
be descried, threading, in dappled streams, the surrounding bush,
converging upon the kraal.  The denizens of the calf-pens might low for
their mothers, and might low in vain; and this was primarily at the root
of the prevailing excitement.

In the neighbourhood of the chief's hut squatted six or eight
head-ringed men, sullen and resentful, conversing not much, and in low
murmurs.  At a respectful distance the young men of the kraal clustered
in dark groups; less reserved, judging from the fierce hubbub of angry
voices, which their elders made no effort to restrain.  Few women were
visible, and such as were, kept well within the shelter of the huts at
the back of those