Part 12 (1/2)

This second outbreak was athan the one of 1893, and as it was evident the forces of the Chartered Company could not handle it, imperial troops were sent to assist theed on until it threatened to last to the rainy season, when the troops one into winter quarters Had they done so, the cost of keeping them would have fallen on the Chartered Coes of the rinderpest and the expenses of the investigation which followed the Jaton looked about for so the war to an i Colonial, na, the Commissioner of the district, that this could be done by destroying the ”God,” or high priest, Umlimo, as the chief inspiration of the rebellion

This high priest had incited the rebels to a general iven the to strike the white soldiers blind and to turn their bullets into water Ar-place of Uton ordered Burnham to penetrate the enemy's lines, find the God, capture him, and if that were not possible to destroy him

The adventure was a most desperate one Ue kopje At the base of this was a village where were gathered two regi e the country was patrolled by roving bands of the ene, the chances were a hundred to one, and the difficulties of the journey are illustrated by the fact that Burnha were unable tothe last mile they consumed three hours When they reached the base of the kopje in which U, they concealed their ponies in a cluan the ascent

Directly below thee, so close that they could s drowsily on the hot, noonday air, voices of the warriors For ranite bowlders around or squirmed and crawled over loose stones which ainto the village After an hour of this tortuous cli the cave suddenly opened before thenized that to take hihold was an impossibility, and that even they themselves would leave the place was equally doubtful So, obeying orders, he fired, killing the man who had boasted he would turn the bullets of his enee as would a stone hurled into an ant-heap

In an instant the veldt beloas black with running er possible, the white er told them they were discovered At the saone for water, saw the ponies, and ran screaive the alarm The race that followed lasted two hours, for so quickly did the Kaffirs spread out on every side that it was iround in any one direction, and he was forced to dodge, turn, and double At one time the white men were driven back to the very kopje from which the race had started

But in the end they evaded assegai and gunfire, and in safety reached Buluwayo This exploit was one of the chief factors in bringing the war to a close The Matabeles, finding their leader was only a mortal like the miracles to their aid, lost heart, and when Cecil Rhodes in personthe hard days of the siege, when rations were few and bad, Burnhairl, who had been the first white child born in Buluwayo, died of fever and lack of proper food This with other causes led him to leave Rhodesia and return to California It is possible he then thought he had forever turned his back on South Africa, but, though he himself had departed, the impression he had made there re in California In Alaska the hunt for gold had just begun, and, the old restlessness seizing him, he left Pasadena and her blue skies, tropical plants, and trolley-car strikes for the ne land of the Klondike With Burnha , that attracts He has helped to reat coanda As he once said: ”It is the constructive side of frontier life thatup of a country, where you see the persistent drive and force of the white man; when the place is finally settled I don't see”

In Alaska he did s, for twenty-four dayssix hundred ainst the country he holds a constant grudge, because it kept hiht with Spain When as declared he was in the wilds and knew nothing of it, and though on his return to civilization he telegraphed Colonel Roosevelt volunteering for the Rough Riders, and at once started south, by the time he had reached Seattle the as over

Several ti this chance to officially fight for his country That he had twice served with English forces made him the more keen to show his loyalty to his own people

That he would have been given a coh Riders seems evident from the opinion President Roosevelt has publicly expressed of him

”I know Burnham,” the President wrote in 1901 ”He is a scout and a hunter of courage and ability, a hter He is the ideal scout, and when enlisted in the reatest benefit”

The truth of this Burnham was soon to prove

In 1899 he had returned to the Klondike, and in January of 1900 had been six way In that same month Lord Roberts sailed for Cape Town to take command of the army, and with him on his staff was Burnhaton One night as the shi+p was in the Bay of Biscay, Carrington was talking of Burnha instances of his marvellous powers as a ”tracker”

”He is the best scout we ever had in South Africa!” Carrington declared

”Then why don't we get him back there?” said Roberts

What followed is well known

Fro Burnham the position, created especially for him, of chief of scouts of the British army in the field

Probably never before in the history of wars has one nation paid so pleasant a tribute to the abilities of aThe cablegraway by the steamer _City of Seattle_ The purser left it at the post-office, and until two hours and a half before the steamer was listed to start on her return trip, there it lay Then Burnha for his mail, received it

In two hours and a half he had his fas on board the steamer, and had started on his half-around-the-world journey froway paper of January 5, 1900, published the day after Burnha of his hasty departure the day before, and of the high cowayan,” it adds: ”Although Mr Burnhaust, and has been North for many months, he has said little of his past, and few have known that he is the man famous over the world as 'the American scout' of the Matabele wars”

Many a man ent to the Klondike did not, for reasons best known to himself, talk about his past But it is characteristic of Burnhah he lived there two years, his associates did not know, until the British Govern them, that he had not always been a prospector like themselves

I was on the same shi+p that carried Burnham the latter half of his journey, frohts was one of a group ofto see a fellow-countryood It was not as though he had a credulous audience of coathered around hiyptian cavalry, Captain Frazer co the Scotch Gillies, Captain Mackie of Lord Roberts's staff, each of as later killed in action; Colonel Sir Charles Hunter of the Royal Rifles, Major Bagot, Major Lord Dudley, and Captain Lord Valentia Each of these had either held co game, and the questions each asked were the outcole evening could a faker have subh which they put Burnhanorance They wanted to knohat difference there is in a coluons, how to tell whether a horse that has passed was going at a trot or a gallop, the way to throw a dia a target of yourself, hohat--and how?