The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1913-03-26

is half desert and half pasture; it is half
 his half plain; and its inhabitants
 $' black, yellow, and white; Totties, Mako
 loos, and ha1f-breeds; half nomad, half squzt1rs, half savage and half beast.
 Governments have located troopers there and forgotten them until they died of the fever and left the land lawless Kings have come into the land and conquered it; but in the end the land has conquered them, it always will, till the sa1t-pans go dry and the sand always advancing east out of the great desert sweeps No Mans Land and obliterates it.
 -- There are no aged sick in No Mans Land Where do they go? Perhaps the baboons, that bark from the cliffs know the old crocodile that beside the ford, where the Makololo girls go with their gourds for water; or the white ants that have heaped up their habitations; the bald vult1res.
 Adrian Ferreira rode transport between Griqua- land and the Diamond Fields during the dry traded blankets and knives for sheep in Khamas country; but when the wet winter the old long ing for solitude urged him to drive his stock down to the sweet weld country that begins where the salt pans end, line of verdure drawn by ruler bound the wastes and the sands. Thus Adrian came into No Mans Land morning and found Hendrika weeping in w1d-melon patch, her child upon her back strapped inside the blanket which her garment.
 Mixed white and Tottie blood flowed in Hendrika's veins During the life of the old who had borne her she hood the mea1ies contented1y and ried water from the spruit in tall gourd which she balanced upon the top of her ochre-reddened hair knot Afterward, by virtue of three cows. she into the possession of prospector who sold her for a wagon, donkey team and two hogsheads of brandy to an itinerant gun runner, who found dead day in No Mans Land after a1tercation with King Bottejohn, with knife left between his shoulders Bottlejohn king of No Mans Land, but he more than king; he was sli1lful herder; he knew A1..A found, and where avoid poison tulip Adrian Fer rera riding into No Mans Land to consult with him when he upon Hendrilca, 1neeing under the vast sky weeping in the wi1d-me1on patch.
 He reined' in and sat watching her for while, let ting his Basuto pony crunch at the gourds, while Hendria seeing him, burst into louder lamentations and her hair; he watched her, little fuddled with Cape smoke, but fine figure of man, scratch ing his head and tugging at his bronze beard per plexed1y.
 What is the matter. grl7" he cried at length. 'rWhy do you make that noise?"
 "My child is wizard and they have cast ont of the kraal,' Hendrika walled, beating her breast
 "Ts he devils chiId7" Ferreira asked in awe
 "No," cried Hendrilca. ''He is King Bottlejohn's. But he has his top teeth first. SeeI She raised he chds face. black with clustering flies. pulled up the lip and disclosed 1ni1l-wtite incisors in the upper jaw.
 "Hemme1P Ferrera, "hzve they cast you out for that7 Who turned you away7"
 "King BottIejohn," Hendrika sobbed. "But it was the Makolo1o women compelled him They have always been jealous of Tonight shall crawl back. md then perhaps we shall stay-who lnows7' She east coquettish glance at Adrian.
 The Dutchrnan gazed upon her in meditation. Hen drika have been seventeen-that is to say, in Ee flower of her age. Her hair long, her skin but little darker than his own; bracelets of hammered poppep flashed her wrists and ankles Adrian had 3 black taint in him. by of which he had Hound peace among the company of his kin; he pne of the hated Catholic Ferreiras bitter the bush pum sardonic and crafty the ha1f-breed takhaars pf the bush weld, who sing psalms instead of hymns, ra witch doctors in time of sickness and their hair round the edge of a pudding basin. Now the blood sang in his veins, and fierce and desirous joy rose up and filled him. He bent down from the sad de and seizng Hendrika, lifted her to the po1e1, biting, struggling and shrieing, while the baby's large head covered with fies lolled loosely from the blanket When she clawed his beard Adrian bound