Part 39 (2/2)

”Let the witness Hernan Pereira be called and sworn”

This was done and he was ordered to tell his tale

Astale, and one that had evidently been prepared with great care I will only set down its blackest falsehoods

He assured the court that he had no enainst me and had never atteh it was true that his heart felt sore because, against her father's will, I had stolen away the affection of his betrothed, as noife He said that he had stopped in Zululand because he knew that I should reat pain for him to see this done

He said that while he was there, before the arrival of the coaan and soed hiaan, to kill the Boers because they were traitors to the sovereign of England, but that he, Dingaan, had refused to do so He said that when Retief caainstinfatuated with me as many others were, and he looked towards the Prinsloos

Then caed in aan in one of his private huts, he overheard a conversation between aan which took place outside the hut, I, of course, not knowing that he ithin The substance of this conversation was that I again urged Dingaan to kill the Boers and afterwards to send an impi to ivethem, and with her a few of my own friends whom I wished should be spared, as I intended to becorant it me, to hold all the land of Natal under his rule and the protection of the English To these proposals Dingaan answered that ”they seeood, and that he would think the out of the hut after Dingaan had gone away he reproached me bitterly for my wickedness, and announced that he would warn the Boers, which he did subsequently by word ofThat thereon I caused him to be detained by the Zulus while I went to Retief and told him some false story about him, Pereira, which caused Retief to drive hiive orders that none of the Boers should sohe could Going to his uncle, Henri Marais, he told him, not all the truth, but that he had learnt for certain that his daughter Marie was in dreadful danger of her life because of so whoer of their lives

Therefore he suggested to Henri Marais that as the General Retief was besotted and would not listen to his story, the best thing they could do was to ride away and warn the Boers This then they did secretly, without the knowledge of Retief, but being delayed upon their journey by one accident and another, which he set out in detail, they only reached the Bushman's River too late, after the massacre had taken place

Subsequently, as the co a rumour that Marie Marais and other Boers had trekked to this place before the slaughter, they ca sent to them by Allan Quatermain, whereon they returned and co Boers at Bushman's River

That was all he had to say

Then, as I reserved ainst me, Henri Marais orn and corroborated his nephew's testihter, his objection to lishman whom he disliked and mistrusted, and so forth He added further that it was true Pereira had told him he had sure inforer froed between Allan Quateraan; that he also had written to Retief and tried to speak to hi Thereon he had ridden away frohter and warn the Boers

That was all he had to say

As there were no further witnesses for the prosecution I cross-exath, but absolutely without results, since every vital question that I asked was ative

Then I called my witnesses, Marie, whose evidence they refused to hear on the ground that she was my wife and prejudiced, the Vrouw Prinsloo and her family, and the Meyers One and all told a true story of aan, so far as they knew them

After this, as the commandant declined to take the evidence of Hans because he was a Hottentot andexactly what had taken place between aan, and how I and Hans came to escape on our second visit to his kraal I pointed out also that unhappily for aan was not available as a witness, and all the others were dead Further, I produced my letter to Marie, which was endorsed by Retief, and the letter to Retief signed by Marais and Pereira which remained in my possession

By the ti and everyone was tired out I was ordered to withdraw under guard, while the court consulted, which it did for a long while Then I was called forward again and the commandant said:

”Allan Quatermain, after prayer to God we have considered this case to the best of our judglishman, a member of a race which hates and has always oppressed our people, and that it was to your interest to get rid of two of them hom you had quarrelled The evidence of Henri Marais and Hernan Pereira, which we cannot disbelieve, shows that you icked enough, either in order to do this, or because of your ainst the Boer people, to plot their destruction with a savage The result is that some seven hundred men, women, and children have lost their lives in a very cruel manner, whereas you, your servant, your wife and your friends have alone escaped unharmed For such a crime as this a hundred deaths could not pay; indeed, God alone can give to it its just punished

We condemn you to be shot as a traitor and a murderer, and may He have mercy on your soul”

At these dreadful words Marie fell to the ground fainting and a pause ensued while she was carried off to the Prinsloos' house, whither the vrouw followed to attend her Then the coh we have thus passed judght be said that we had prejudices, and because you have had no opportunity of preparing a defence, and no witnesses to the facts, since all those whoht that this unanieneral court of the e you will be taken with us to the Bushman's River camp, where the case will be settled, and, if necessary, execution done in accordance with the verdict of the generals and veld-cornets of that camp Meanwhile you will be kept in custody in your own house Now have you anything to say against this sentence?”

”Yes, this,” I answered, ”that although you do not know it, it is an unjust sentence, built up on the lies of one who has always been my enemy, and of a man whose brain is rotten I never betrayed the Boers

If anyone betrayed them it was Hernan Pereira himself, who, as I proved to the General Retief, had been praying Dingaan to kill me, and whom Retief threatened to put upon his trial for this very crime, for which reason and no other Pereira fled fro his tool Henri Marais with hie him and Henri Marais also, and I knoill in one way or another As forthe cause of you Boers Shoot me now if you will, and make an end But I tell you that if I escape your hands I will not suffer this treato unpunished I will lay my case before the rulers of my people, and if necessary before my Queen, yes, if I have to travel to London to do it, and you Boers shall learn that you cannot condelishman upon false testireat if I live, and if I die it shall be greater still”

Now these words, very foolish words, I ad and inexperienced I spoke in reat ies They believed, to be fair to them, that they had passed a just sentence Blinded by prejudice and falsehood, and maddened by the dreadful losses their people had suffered during the past few days at the hands of a devilish savage, they believed that I was the instigator of those losses, one who ought to die Indeed, all, or nearly all the Boers were persuaded that Dingaan was urged to this lishmen The mere fact of my own and my servant's miraculous escape, when all uilt to the no lawyers, they thought sufficient to justify their verdict

Still, they had an uneasy suspicion that this evidence was not conclusive, and ht indeed be rejected in toto by a rounds Also they knew theht to forland, from which for a little while they had escaped If I were allowed to tell ht not happen to them, they wondered--to them who had ventured to pass sentence of death upon a subject of the Queen of Great Britain? Might not this turn the scale against theht not Britain arise in wrath and crush them, these men who dared to invoke her forms of law in order to kill her citizen? Those, as I learned afterwards, were the thoughts that passed through their h their minds--that if the sentence were executed at once, a dead man cannot appeal, and that here I had no friends to take upOnly at a sign I was uard