Chapter I

Foreword--My father's family--"Old Body"--Dualla--A cruel experiment--"Old Body"--and the goose--Cook and kitchen-maid--Scull and monkey--My mother's family--Abbey view--The Bock of Cashel--Captain Meagher and early chess Sir Dominic Corrigan--"Old Mary" and the sugar--Naval ambitions--Harper Twelvetree and the burial agency

CHAPTER II

Improved health--Jimmy Kinsella--Veld food--I abscond--Father Healy on conversion--Father O'Dwyer and his whip--Confession--Construction of a volcano--The Fenian outbreak--Departure for South Africa--The tuneful soldier--Chess at sea--Madeira A gale--The Asia

CHAPTER III

Arrival at Cape Town--Port Elizabeth--First encounter with big game Grahamstown--Severe thunderstorm--King William's Town Natives and their ponies--Social peculiarities--Farming--The annual trek--Camp-life Surf-bathing--Self-sacrificing attitude of Larry O'Toole--Capture of an ant-bear--The coast scenery--A moral shock--School Chief Toise--Rainy seasons--Flooded rivers

CHAPTER IV

Trip to the Transkei--Tiyo Soga and his family--Trip to the seaside--The Fynns--Wild dogs--Start as a sheep farmer--My camp burnt out--First commercial adventure--Chief Sandile--Discovery of diamonds--Start for Golconda--Traveling companions--Manslaughter narrowly escaped--Old De Beers--Life at the Diamond Fields--Scarcity of water--First case of diamond stealing--I nearly discover Kimberley Mine--The rush to Colesberg Kopje--My first diamond--Its loss and my humiliation--Kimberley claims dear at 10--Camp-life in early days--I. D. B.--Canteen burning.

CHAPTER V

My claim a disappointment--Good results attained elsewhere--A surprised Boer--"Kopje wallopers"--Thunderstorms--A shocking spectacle--"Old Moore" and his love affair--The morning market--Attack of enteric--I go to King William's Town to recruit Toby once more--A venture in onions--Return to Kimberley--The West End mess--The Rhodes brothers--Norman Garstin--H. C. Seppings Wright--"Schipka" Campbell--Cecil John Rhodes--A game of euchre The church bell--Raw natives--Alum diamonds--Herbert Rhodes and the cannon His terrible end.

CHAPTER VI

Big gambling--Von Schlichmann--Norman Garstin--The painter of St. Michael's Mount--Start for the gold fields--"I am going to be hanged" Plentifulness of game--Snakes in an anthill--Nazareth--Game in the High Veld--Narrow escape from frost-bite--A shooting match--Lydenburg--Painful tramping--"Artful Joe"--Penalty for suicide--Pilgrim's Rest--Experiences of "a new chum"--Tent-making--Explorations--The Great Plateau--Prospect of the Low Country--Elands.

CHAPTER VII

Extended rambles--View from the mountain top--An unknown land--The deadly fever--Gray's fate--Lack of nursing--Temperature rises after death Pilgrim's Rest in early days--The prison--The stocks--No color line--John Cameron in trouble--The creek "lead"--Plenty of gold--Wild peaches Massacres of natives in old days--Kameel--His expressions--Life on the creek--Major Macdonald--The parson--Boulders--Bad accidents--A quaint signboard--"Reefing Charlie".

CHAPTER VIII

Work on "the Reef"--Shaft-sinking in a swamp--Wolff and McGrath--A case of snake-bite--Tunneling--Humping green timber--John Mulcahy--His Gargantuan breakfast--His peculiar habits--His end--The rush to "the Reef" Cunningham's lead--My bad luck--Peter and his appetite--"Mr. William Bogis" Fabayne, the cave-dweller--A bellicose bridegroom--Knox and his revolver practice--A senseless toast and its sequel--A terrible accident Alick Dempster and the Police News.

CHAPTER IX

Expedition to Delagoa Bay--A rencontre at Constantinople--Morisot and the lion--Game in the Low Country--The Barber encampment--Lion's attack by daylight--Lions in the donga--The lion's voice--Ways of the lion--The lion an eater of carrion--Tyrer and the buffalo--Veld fires--A piece of bad luck--The Low Country rivers--Snakes--Hyenas--Louren Marques--Funeral of Pat Foote--Discovery of gold near Blyde River--Anticipated affluence Disappointment

CHAPTER X

Prospectors start for Swaziland--Rumors as to their fate--MacLean and I decide to follow them--Precautions against lions--The Crocodile River--The Boer and the pessimist--Game and honey--Crocodiles--Difficulties in crossing the river--MacLean nearly drowned in the rapids--I go on alone First sight of De Kaap--A labyrinth of dongas--I reach Swaziland--Baboons On the trail of the prospectors--The mystery solved--'Ntshindeen's Kraal Swazi hospitality--How I became celebrated--A popular show--Repairing guns Character of the Swazis--Contempt for money and love of salt--Prospecting My welcome outstayed--A dangerous crisis--Return to the Crocodile River The rhinoceros--Our bearers decamp--We abandon our goods--Attacked by fever--Terror of partridges--Arrival at Mac Mac.

CHAPTER XI

Weakness after fever--I engage in commerce--Bats--The commandeered cat--My commercial ineptitude--Tom Simpson surprises--Wolff--Close of my commercial career--Saulez--His thrashing of the bullies--Gardiner holds up the bank--Nicknames--Conferring a patent of nobility--"Old Nelly"--"A poor man's lead"--"Charlie Brown's Gully"--Swindled by my partner--My discovery on the mountain--A lonely time--Waiting for rain--Disappointment and despair--Abandonment of my work--Departure--Once more a tramp.