At breakfast the chief appeared particularly uneasy and evidently annoyed at the vigilance with which I watched him. He observed peevishly, “What have the cattle done that you want them? or why must I see my subjects deprived of them?” I said, “These are odd questions to ask, Hintza. You well know the outrages committed in the Colony by your people; it is in redress of these wrongs I march, and at your own request.”
At ten o’clock I again marched. Hintza suddenly became in high spirits, and observed sarcastically, “See how my subjects treat me: they drive the cattle away in spite of me.” “Hintza,” I said, “I do not want your subjects’ cattle; I am sent for the colonial cattle which have been stolen, and which I will have.” “Then,” said the chief, “allow me to send forward Umtini, my principal councillor, to tell my people I am here, that they must not drive away their cattle, and that the cattle of your own nation will alone be selected.” This proposal I immediately agreed to, as it appeared to hold out some chance of success, although I could not divest myself of the opinion that Hintza was meditating some mischief. I particularly enjoined Umtini to return at night, and this he promised faithfully to do.
Umtini quitted the line of march at full speed, accompanied by one of Hintza’s attendants, the chief exclaiming, in high spirits, “Now you need not go to the Bashee; you will have more cattle than you can drive on the Xabecca”—a small river which we were rapidly approaching.
On my nearing the stream, it was found that the spoor or track of the cattle branched off in two directions—one to the left, up a high mountain; the other to the right, up a very steep, abrupt, high, and wooded hill upon the banks of the Xabecca.[106] The river-bed below was rugged, precipitous, and covered with brushwood. Hintza said, “We must follow the track to our right; the cattle which are gone to the left up the mountain are lost to us.” This desire of his I resolved to follow, and crossed the Xabecca accordingly.
It had been remarked that this morning Hintza rode a remarkable fine and powerful horse, which he spared fatigue by leading him up any hill we came across during the march. On the opposite side of the Xabecca the ascent was steep, precipitous, and woody. I was riding at the head of the column, when I heard a rush of horses behind me, and called out to the Corps of Guides, in whose particular charge Hintza was. I then observed the chief and all his followers riding up quickly to me and passing me in the bushes on both sides. The Corps of Guides called my attention to the circumstance, and I exclaimed to Hintza, “Stop!” At this moment the chief, having moved to one side of the track which we were marching on, became entangled among the bushes and was obliged to descend again on to the path before us. I drew a pistol, at which the chief smiled so ingenuously, I nearly felt regret at my suspicions, and I allowed the chief to ride on, preceded by some of the Corps of Guides, his guards, who had pushed forward to intercept him if he attempted to escape.
On reaching the top of this ascent, we found the country perfectly open, and parallel with the rugged and wooded bed of the Xabecca (calculated for the resort, cover, and protection of the Kafir), a considerable tongue of land ran for about two miles and terminated at the bend of the river, where was a Kafir village. On reaching the top, my mind was occupied with the march of the troops up this steep ascent, and I was looking back to observe their appearance, when the chief set off at full speed, passing the Guides in front, towards the village in the distance. Two of the Guides, active fellows, Messrs. Southey and Shaw, set off, exclaiming, “Oh, Colonel, Colonel, look!” My first glance showed me the treachery, and both spurs were dashed into my horse’s sides, a noble animal of best English blood. The chief was at least two hundred yards ahead of me, and for half a mile his horse was as fast as mine. It was a capital horse in good condition, given to him some months before by Colonel Somerset. After that distance I found I rapidly neared him, and when within a distance of forty yards I pulled out a pistol. It snapped. I tried a second, with equal ill success. At this moment Hintza’s horse gained on me, and I found that in the pursuit I had rushed my horse with such violence I had nearly blown him, and that, if I must take the chief, it was necessary to nurse my horse a little. In about a quarter of a mile I again closed with him. I had no sword on, but I struck him with the butt end of a pistol, which flew out of my hand. He was jobbing at me furiously with his assagai. I rode upon his right to prevent him turning down into the bed of the river, which I supposed (as afterwards it proved) was full of Kafirs in waiting to receive him.
I was now rapidly approaching the Kafir huts, and the blood of my horse gave me great advantage over Hintza. I tried to seize his bridle-reins, but he parried my attempt with his assagai. I prayed him to stop, but he was in a state of frenzy. At this point of desperation, a whisper came into my ear, “Pull him off his horse!” I shall not, nor ever could, forget the peculiarity of this whisper. No time was to be lost. I immediately rode so close to him that his assagai was comparatively harmless, and, seizing him by the collar of his karosse (or tiger-skin cloak), I found I could shake him in his seat. I made a desperate effort by urging my horse to pass his, and I hurled him to the ground.
My horse was naturally of a violent temper, and, from the manner I had spurred him and rushed him about, he became furious. Having now recovered and running on his second wind, I could not pull him up, and he ran away with me to the Kafir village. I expected to feel a hundred assagais at me in a moment, but all the Kafirs had gone down into the river. I dropped the reins on one side, and with both hands hauled his head round. I then spurred him violently and drove him right upon a Kafir hut, by which he nearly fell, and I got him round with his head the right way, viz. back again, and did not spare the spurs.
The Kafir’s fall created delay sufficient for the foremost of the Guides, Southey, to approach within gunshot. Southey shot the Kafir Larunu, and as Hintza was running into the bed of the river, called to him to stop. At this moment I was within hailing distance, and I desired Mr. Southey, “Fire, fire at him.” He did so from about two hundred yards off. The chief fell, and I pulled up, thinking he was knocked over. He was on his legs again in a moment, and so close to the bush he succeeded in gaining it. I made instant arrangements with the troops to invest as much of the bush as I could, in the hope of intercepting him. In the mean time, however, with the utmost rapidity, Southey and my A.D.C., Lieut. Balfour, 72nd Regiment, pursued him into the bush, the former keeping up, the latter down the stream, when Southey was suddenly startled by an assagai striking the stone or cliff on which he was climbing. Turning quickly round, he perceived a Kafir, his head and uplifted assagai only visible, and so close, he had to recoil to bring up his gun. It was an act like lightning; either the Kafir would send the assagai first, or the shot must fall. Southey was first, and fired and shot the Kafir, whom to his astonishment he found to be the chief.
Southey immediately galloped towards me. There was a cry, “Hintza is taken,” at which I was not a little delighted, and I sent the sergeant of my escort, Japps, to bring him to me in a rein or halter, but by no means to treat him roughly. In a few seconds Southey reported the melancholy truth. I say “melancholy” because I had much rather he had been taken, but I thanked Southey for his exertions, and there was no one act I could upbraid myself with as contributing to the chief’s attempt to escape after the warning I had given him and the kindness and respect I had treated him with, and after having, merely to please him, marched, as he pretended, to his assistance.