Great-grandfather Joubert was a very patriarch in years. A full century had passed over his head. They had all been such active years, full of stirring memories. Through his rugged features there shone the same big-hearted kindliness which had marked all his days.

Petrus loved him. No one could tell quite such fascinating tales as he; thrilling tales of early adventure and conquests; of hair-breadth escapes from wild animals and savage natives in the final conquering of the African Veldt; tales of the terrible "Border Wars," and of long wars against the British.

To Great-grandfather Joubert his country's history was sacred history. It had all taken place before his very eyes. In fact, he had helped to make it. Even in his eighty-fifth year he had scaled the Transvaal hills and done scouting duty with all but the agility of his sons, grandsons, and great-grandsons fighting bravely at his side.

He often sat thinking it over. Few of the old "Voor-trekker" Boers were still living—those who had "trekked" in their great ox-wagons across the deadly "Karroo," finally to settle in the Transvaal. But that great "Exodus"—known in Boer history as the "Great Trek of 1836"—was one of Great-grandfather Joubert's most vivid memories. He was but a boy then.

The mid-summer heat was so oppressive that Great-grandfather Joubert had asked to have his comfortable armchair moved over close by the open window, just above the syringa bush. He liked the scent.

But two weeks now remained until Christmas time—about the hottest season of the year in South Africa. In another week would come the yearly festival commemorating that tragic episode of December 16, 1836, "Dangaan's Daag," when the immortal Piet Retief, with a number of the Voor-trekkers, left the main party and made their way down into Natal, only to be massacred by the Zulus.

All day long Great-grandfather Joubert sat there beside the open window smoking his ornate pipe filled with fragrant tobacco and reading from the large, silver-bound Bible on his knees, whose open pages were swept by his long, grizzly beard. He was a typical "Takhaar" Boer.

Aunt Johanna had brought him the Sacred Book, with some hot coffee and rolls. From the window he could see Uncle Abraham riding about the farm to see that his beasts were all right, counting his flocks, and superintending his Kafirs.

The Hottentot maids fetched him his dinner. Then Petrus brought him the latest Johannesburg and London daily newspapers. He often sat and read to him carefully everything of interest—especially the latest "war-news"—which filled all the leading pages, nowadays, with accounts of the terrible "world-war" raging throughout Europe between Germany and the Allies. Thus Great Britain—their mother-country—had been plunged into the fearful conflict. Great-grandfather Joubert wished he was younger that he might go himself to fight for his king. "Race-hatred" had no place in his feelings. The Jouberts belonged to the more intelligent, unprejudiced class of Boers who had long ceased to regard the British as intruders. He had always believed with Paul Kruger—the great Boer leader of his day—that "Where love dwells prosperity follows."

As he re-read the old story of the wanderings of the Israelites in the Wilderness—they scarcely knew whither—the trials and hardships they had encountered—it seemed to him that the Sacred Book was telling the story of the "Great Trek" of his own people. The Boers, too, had wandered forth—had suffered hardship and injustice no less than had the patriarchs of old—he told himself. Closing the book, he folded his hands, and, leaning comfortably back in his armchair, he gazed far across the grassy sweep of high veldt, with its red-brown scattered kopjes, towards the western horizon. Soon he was lost in the memories of a century.

Softly the room door opened. In a twinkling Petrus' arms were flung around the old man's neck.

"A penny for your thoughts, Grandfather dear! Please let me stay here with you a while," begged the boy.

"Ah, Koos, is it you, my boy? Yes, yes, you may stay a while if you do not ask too many questions. It is easy to guess your thoughts. Let me try. Your visit with Aunt Kotie at Johannesburg next week. Your trip to Cape Town with Lieutenant Wortley and George. Hurrying back home in time for Christmas. Isn't that right, Koos?"

"Yes, Grandfather, and George is expecting a big Christmas box from his Aunt Edith in England. Now for yours!"

"I should have to take you back to the early days in the Old Colony, Koos, when I was but a boy like yourself. And, like you, I used to beg my old grandfather for 'stories' of his country, which was France. He was one of several hundred French Huguenots who fled from their own country to South Africa, because they could not worship as they liked. Those were happy days in the Old Colony there on our large, quiet farms, before British rule became intolerable. Our people were prosperous slave-holders. My father owned as many as eighty Hottentots. But as British oppression became more and more intolerable—our slaves liberated, and indignities of every kind heaped upon us—our Boer leaders resolved to endure no more and the great 'Exodus'—known in history as the 'Great Trek of 1836'—began. I shall never forget those awful days. I was just a boy then."

"Why didn't the Boers rebel?" indignantly questioned Petrus.

"Rebellion was useless. But we knew of a vast land that stretched away to the north of us. To be sure, it was filled with savages and ferocious wild animals, but even that was preferable to British tyranny. There were about six thousand of us in all who left our fertile coastland farms and trekked forth into the unknown wilderness in search of new homes where we could live in peace. One by one, we loaded up our huge ox-drawn wagons, which were to serve as home, fort and wagon for many a long day on our journey. Inside these great covered wagons—'rolling-houses'—the Zulus called them—the women and children were seated. Outside—tramping alongside as a guard—carrying their well-oiled, long-barreled guns—were the men. The older children helped to drive and round up the great flocks and herds which accompanied our migration. Well do I remember the cries of a small, bare-foot boy of ten, running at the head of a long team of tired oxen, which now and then quickened its pace at the touch of his sjambok. Who do you suppose that bit of a boy was, Koos?"

"You, Grandfather?"

"No, no, Koos. That little fellow was only about half my size then, but, since those hard days, he has four times ruled our glorious Transvaal as its President, and often fought with us all for our country's freedom."

"Oh, I know! President Kruger?"

"Yes, Koos, that ragged little boy was none other than Paul Stephanus Kruger."

"Go on, Grandfather. Did the Voor-trekkers come straight to the Transvaal with all their covered ox-wagons and everything?"

"No, Koos. There were the great desolate stretches of the 'Karroo' to be crossed, with such dangers and hardships by day and night that many of our oxen soon trekked their last trek. The loud gun-like crack of the long ox-whips, as they whirled over the poor oxen's heads—and fell with a savage blow on their brown hides—to the driver's yell: 'TREK'!—is still in my ears. Those whips, made from the hide of giraffes, were usually eighteen or twenty feet long.

"This great 'Exodus'—or 'the Boer Mayflower trip'—as your cousins in New York City once described it—was full of all kinds of experiences and suffering. Vast herds of wild elephants impeded our way. Flocks of ostriches, with herds of zebras, antelopes, gnus and quaggas, covered the plains in such vast numbers that at times the whole landscape was obscured. Poisonous snakes glided from among the bushes in front of us—and there was scarcely a rocky kloof or kopje but sheltered a ravenous lion or leopard."

"Oh, Grandfather! and were your dangers over when you'd crossed that terrible Karroo?"

"No, Koos, they were just beginning. All the Voor-trekkers did not go in one direction. They spread out like a fan from the Mother Colony, advancing by different routes. About two hundred followed Hendrik Potgieter to the banks of the Vaal, into the land we now call the Orange Free State. Another small party trekked its way down to Delegoa Bay where all but two perished from the horrible poisonous marshes. I was with the main party, which continued on farther northward, and finally settled here in the Transvaal. Here we encountered the fierce Matebele, who attacked us in large numbers. Quickly we chained our wagons together into a huge circle—making a 'lagger' or fort of them, and fired on the savages from that ambuscade—our women bravely loading and re-loading our guns for us. They rushed madly upon us and fought like demons—stabbing in through the spokes of the wheels. Desperate as we were, Boers are good marksmen, and finally the Matebele were driven off, but not until many of our brave people were massacred, and six thousand head of our cattle and sheep taken. Then we had fifty years of terrible Kafir wars—Zulu wars—and Border Wars of the most horrible kind against the savage natives before we could possess the land—our own Transvaal—in peace."

"Oh, Grandfather! Grandfather! I'm so glad your life was spared!" cried Petrus, flinging his arms tightly about his great-grandfather's neck. "But you forgot to tell me the story of 'Dangaan's Daag' and Piet Retief." Petrus never tired of hearing of that famous march of the Voor-trekkers to Natal under their heroic leader, Piet Retief. History tells us it was comparable only to the march of the Greek Ten Thousand in Asia.

"No, Koos, I've told you that story a hundred times. I'm thankful I did not join that fatal party. One of your uncles went."

"Was it Uncle Petrus Jacobus, Grandfather? The one who was made President next after Kruger, and who became a famous general? The one who was made commander-in-chief of all the Boer forces, and gained the victories of Majuba Hill and Laing's Neck, against the British? The uncle whose name I bear? Oh, Grandfather, may I see his picture? The one in your old iron chest?" begged Petrus excitedly.

"Here is the key, Koos. Lift out the things. It is in an old portfolio down in the very bottom."

One by one, Petrus spread the precious keepsakes from the Boer war on the floor about the old chest. It was a strange collection. The first thing his hand touched, was an old "bandoler"—or cartridge-belt—heavy with unspent cartridges—now green with mold. Petrus laid it on the floor at his great-grandfather's feet. Next came a long-barreled, old gun—the sight of which made Koos' eyes sparkle with interest, but a tear fell down the old Boer's bronzed cheek as he lifted the rusty Mauser and read the words cut on its stock thirteen years ago: "For God, Country, and Justice." Silently he examined it, but Koos could read in his flashing eyes that he was hearing again the distant rolling of artillery, the crackling of rifles, the shrieking of shells through the air—made bright by the sweeping searchlights of the enemy. Then Petrus lifted out an old broad-brimmed slouch hat. Embroidered on the band around its crown were the words: "For God and Freedom," and sewed on one side of the upturned brim was a rosette of the "Vier-kleur," and the fluffy brown tail of a meerscat. A small roll containing a blanket and a mackintosh came next.

"Grandfather, I don't see the portfolio," protested Koos, who had about reached the bottom of the old chest.

"Go on, Koos, you will find it along with my old Bible—the one I read between battles."

Carefully Petrus lifted out a great silken flag and unfurled it—its bright horizontal stripes of red, white and blue, being crossed by a band of green—the "Vier-kleur" of the Republic. Within the folds of the old flag he had found a well-worn pocket Bible and the portfolio.

"Hand me the flag, too, Koos," said the old man. He touched its silken folds tenderly—almost with affection. "This flag belonged to the days before the annexation of the Transvaal to Great Britain—before our present 'Union of South Africa' existed. Its colors tell of the time when the Transvaal was the 'South African Republic,' Koos."

"Shall we always have to fly the 'Union Jack' in the Transvaal, Grandfather? George says it helps him to feel more at home down here."

"It may be God's will, Petrus. Let us hope that the worst of our troubles are forever over. During the thirteen years since peace was signed between Great Britain and the Transvaal our friendly relations have been deepening. A new era of progress, prosperity and peace seems to have come for the Transvaal. Our future looks bright."

"The portfolio, Grandfather? Is Uncle Petrus' picture there? And tell me all about his great victories of Majuba Hill and Laing's Neck, won't you? I've never heard enough about them."

"I can't talk of those days, Koos. Divine favor guided our footsteps, and, victories though they were, those days cost us many of our best-loved kinsfolk—even your little thirteen-year-old cousin Martinus, who fought so bravely in the 'Penkop Regiment'—a whole regiment made up of school-children like himself. There were also great-grandfathers like myself. Paul Kruger was seventy-five, and hundreds of his gray-haired burghers fighting with him were even older. Your Uncle Petrus, when in command of all the Boer forces, was very close to seventy.

"We never wanted to fight and kill our fellow-beings. It was heart-rending to us," continued the aged man, vehemently, as he handed Petrus the picture of General Joubert. "All we asked for was peace to cultivate the soil, and worship together. But every burgher in the Transvaal—from President Kruger and your Uncle Petrus down to little Martinus—swore to yield his life's blood rather than fail to defend his country's right to freedom. For that their fathers had suffered and died."

"I've heard Uncle Abraham say that it was just a 'Wait-a-bit' peace the Boers signed in 1902, Grandfather. Do you think so?"

"No, Petrus. Loyalty to the mother country is deepening in the Transvaal every day. Premier Botha and all his people are ready to fight in her behalf at any time. Now run along. There comes George galloping across to see you, Koos. I'll put these things back in the chest myself."

"Thank you, Grandfather dear, for all you've told me," called back Petrus, as he bounded downstairs to meet George, who had come to take part in the short twilight games of the early tropical evening which Petrus, Franzina, Yettie and Theunis always played together just before dinner-time.

Scarcely had darkness given place to a bright moonlight than Magdalena's favorite "freyer"[13]—Hercules van der Groot—came riding over on his "kop-spuiling" courting horse—tossing his head, prancing and jumping all the way (being sharply bitted and curbed for the purpose). As Hercules always liked to look very imposing on these important courting occasions he had decked himself out in a fine yellow cord jacket, vest and trousers, changed his veldt-schoens for a pair of shiny tight patent-leather congress gaiters, above which he wore a pair of showy leather leggings. Waving gracefully in the breeze from one side of his broad-brimmed white felt slouch hat was a tall ostrich plume—and in his pocket he had not forgotten to place a nice box of "Dutch Mottoes." He had ridden twenty miles from his father's farm Vergelegen.[14]

Upon Aunt Johanna's inviting him to enter, he politely shook hands with each member of the family, then seated himself in a corner against the wall, patiently waiting for an opportunity to speak alone with Magdalena, when he quickly whispered in her ear: "We'll set oop this necht."

Finally, after the family had retired, Magdalena appeared dressed in a pink dress with bright ribbons of every shade, and much jewelry encircling her neck. In one hand she carried a match box and in the other a piece of candle, which—to Hercules' delight—he noticed was a long one. According to rigid Boer etiquette he must depart when the candle had burned out. Together they lighted the taper and placed it upon the table alongside the plate of "Candy Lakkers" which Magdalena had that morning made especially for her freyer, who produced his "Dutch Mottoes." As Hercules kept an eye on the diminishing candle, anxiously guarding it from drafts, seeing to it that it should not flit or flare, and trimming it from time to time, he told her how much he admired her uncle's new horses, how well the oxen looked after the rain, and other such interesting things—not forgetting to assure her that he loved her very much. But as time flies with lovers so with lights, and the interview was abruptly terminated, but not before it was agreed they should be married on New Year's Day, and that their honeymoon trip should be to the Victoria Falls on the Zambesi.