“Rather—mind you do; we’ll be only too glad,” answered Hicks with a yawn, as he blew out the candle; and in five minutes more a mild snore or so showed that he was out of reach of any further conversation.
Jeffreys lay and ruminated. Here, at any rate, he would be in his element. What sort of a figure would that stuck-up, priggish fool—again, reader, pardon a jealous man—cut in the cattle kraal among the clashing horns and the charging of maddened beasts, and all the dash and excitement of a piece of very rough work, by no means unattended with danger? He was all there in the drawing-room; but where would he be at this? And Jeffreys dropped off to sleep with a sardonic grin upon his countenance, to dream of his rival—for so he had already begun to regard Claverton—losing nerve, and being tossed and trampled by the wildest brute in the herd. As to the fulfilment of which benevolent expectation the morrow would show.
Note 1. No native is allowed to remove stock from the colony without a pass granted by his late employer to certify that he acquired it lawfully. This pass is countersigned by the various magistrates and native agents along the road.
Volume One—Chapter Seven.
The cattle-branding.
“Here they come. Is the whole of that lot to be done to-day, Xuvani?”
“Ja, Baas,” replied that worthy, swinging back the ponderous gate of the cattle enclosure where he and Jeffreys were standing.