eside one of the fallen animals, and his knife was at work; and
now I realized why he had picked his victims, and had shot so many. It
was not food he wanted, but drink, and he had shot only the cows, whose
udders were full of rich sweet milk. It was time, too, that he drank,
for he could not speak, and his cracked and swollen lips and blood-shot
eyes told a tale of awful suffering.

Soon, however, he was able to talk. "The storm, master," he said; "near
was I to being buried alive and I thought thee dead! Yet, could I not
return before, for I have found no water. The other pan is dry also,
but now I have seen from far off a spot where water is, and so I
hastened back to find my master. It is far, but we shall win through."
Caught by the storm between the two pans he had been hours staggering
through the raging chaos, and had reached the pan only after the sun
had risen and the storm had ceased to find it without a vestige of
water.

Casting about in the dunes, he had searched for t'samma without avail,
and filled with anxiety for me had been torn between a desire to return
at once, and the absolute necessity of finding water. Hurrying from one
prominent dune to another he had scanned the desert in all directions,
and had even found one or two more pans, but again waterless. One,
however, showed that it had held water recently for it was still moist,
and there he had found a flock of the tiny Namaqua partridge, so
plentiful in certain parts of the desert. These little birds are swift
of flight, and fly long distances in search of water; and Inyati, as
they rose in a cloud from their old drinking place, had marked the
direction of their flight. North-east they went, and his keen eyes had
followed them till they were no longer visible, and as he watched he
saw many other flocks, and all flying in the same direction. "There is
the water," thought Inyati, and he had toiled on in their wake, but the
way was far, and it was hours before, from a high dune, he had seen a
large pan in the distance, to which all the birds were converging. "A
big pan, master," he said, "with thick bush and big trees an oasis or
perhaps who knows? a river bed." And frantic with thirst as he was, he
had not gone on, but turned back hoping to find me alive.

My heart leapt with joy at the news, for with the knowledge that water
awaited us we could struggle on but the horses? Inyati shook his head
as he examined them. "That one will die before morni