colour, we should have to avoid battle for a couple of months, as the result would be uncertain.

By the evening every soul in our and the native camps around had turned out to see what would happen, and Sefu's hosts on the opposite hills were also eagerly watching. We had a few dozen signal rockets with us, of which, however, only a dozen were in good order, and which had been kept in the event of a great emergency. When the Commandant ordered three of the red signal rockets to be fired, the yell of joy that rang through the camp was perfectly appalling. As the onlookers realised that the “medicine” was red, three times repeated, they danced round us in a perfect frenzy of joy, and demanded that powder should be given to them to make a night of it.

It is a characteristic of