urse. His sufferings were extreme.
His legs were swollen, cut, and bleeding; his naked shoulders--for they
had stripped him almost naked--burned and blistered with the sun; and
although his tongue was parched and his head drooping wearily on his
breast, no one offered him a mouthful of water.

He begged them to kill him. Perhaps the _cacique_, who was almost a white
man, understood his meaning, for he grinned in derision and pointed to his
own bullet-wounded arm. The _cacique_ knew well there were sufferings
possible compared to which death itself would be as pleasure.

When the Indians at last went into camp--which they did but for a
night--he was released, but guarded; a hunk of raw guanaco meat was thrown
to him, which he tried to suck for the juices it contained.

Next day they went on and on again, over a wild pampa land now, with here
and there a bush or tussock of grass or thistles, and here and there a
giant ombu-tree. His ankles were more painful than ever, his shoulders
were raw, the horse he rode was often prodded with a spear, and he too
was wounded at the same time. Once or twice the _cacique_, maddened by the
pain of his wound, rushed at Dalston with uplifted knife, and the wretched
prisoner begged that the blow might fall.

Towards evening they reached a kind of hill and forest land, where the
flowering cacti rose high above the tallest spear. Then they came to a
ruin. Indians here were in full force, horses dashed to and fro, and it
was evident from the bustle and stir that they were on the war-path, and
soon either to attack or be attacked.

The prisoner was now roughly unhorsed and cruelly lashed to a tree, and
left unheeded by all. For a moment or two he felt grateful for the shade,
but his position after a time became painful in the extreme. At night-fall
all the Indians left, and soon after the sufferings of the poor wretch
grew more dreadful than pen can describe. He was being slowly eaten alive
by myriads of insects that crept and crawled or flew; horrid spiders with
hairy legs and of enormous size ran over his neck and naked chest,
loathsome centipedes wriggled over his shoulders and face and bit him, and
ants covered him black from head to feet. Towards dusk a great jaguar went
prowling past, looked at him with green fierce eyes, snarled low, and went
on. Vultures alighted near him, but they too passed by; they could wait.
Then it was night, and many of the insect pests grew luminous. They
f