And as we marched down—quietly at first—to fling ourselves in full charge upon the Zulu host, we could hardly believe our ears. The sound of a war-song rose upon the air, nearer and nearer, as though sung by men coming up the great pass—
“Yaingahlabi!
Leyo ’Nkunzi! Yai ukúfa!”
Ha! It was our own song—the war-song of the King. Our enemies heard it, too, though the Song of the Shield had not floated to their ears, being audible to ourselves alone, for the dense ranks, which had been squatting on the ground as though to rest, sprang into life, and heads were eagerly turned in the direction of this new force. We, however, hoped but little from this, for those who had been left to guard the defile under Gasibona would be but a mere mouthful in the open field of battle. But, as I saw the shields of the foremost emerging from between the cliffs, I glanced upward once more. The signal was to charge—to charge swiftly, and at once.
“Follow me now, my children!” I cried. “Follow the white shield!”
We hurled ourselves forward, and for a moment nothing was heard but the hissing of war-whistles and the rush of feet. Then—au! a crash as of a wave upon a hard rock. So hard had we struck them, so fierce had been the shock, that we rolled them back—at first. Hundreds lay dead and writhing, and still the burning hiss of the spear as it did its work!
At first—only at first. They came at us again. They were closing round us. I saw panic in my ranks.
“The shield! the white shield!” I roared. “Come beneath it, ye who fear.”
The shrinking, their spirits renewed, answered with a wild yell. Then we “saw red” as we stabbed and struggled. Ha! they yield. Yes, that dense host was falling back before us—before us—a handful of men! A wild shout arose from its midst—a shout of dismay. And as we pressed them, giving them not a moment wherein to recover themselves, we beheld the reason.
Pouring around the end of the spur came a great cloud of dust, and through it shields and spears. We needed not the alarm and confusion of the Zulu host to tell us that these were our own people, as, indeed, they were. It was Kalipe’s impi. Roaring the war-shout of Umzilikazi, they fell upon Mhlangana’s force, and at the same time the warriors who had issued from the pass assailed it furiously upon that side. Dismay and panic now took hold of the great impi. Thus suddenly attacked on three sides, realising that they had under-estimated both our strength and strategy, the warriors of Dingane turned and fled by the way which was still open, yet fast closing up, and we—we purposely refrained from closing quite their way because we could slay more of them in their flight, and with small loss to our own side, whereas, did we hem them in—these fierce and desperate Zulu lions—there was no foretelling the issue of the fray, for even yet they were equal to us in numbers. Panic alone was their destruction.
But although we thus left a way open for them to flee, we pressed them hard—au! we pressed them hard. We smote them as they fled, striking them down by scores, but I and Kalipe, and the other war-captains were too wary to allow this to continue, even if we had not seen the King’s signal of recall. So, singing in mockery after them the war-song of Dingane, we left the pursuit and returned in triumph.