cks
that I had seen since we entered the desert it seemed a lifetime back!

The kopje was in the right direction too, for Inyati had said "keep
north" and by reaching it I should at least be able to spy out the
land.

I lost no time in saddling up, finding that I had still a small amount
of biltong and plenty of ammunition left. Nearly all night I trekked
through barren dunes, but these were now small and easy to traverse
compared to the mountains of sand I had already passed through, and
when I lay down for an hour before dawn I felt sure daylight would show
me to be near the kopje. Such was the case, for I found myself barely a
mile from it, and soon had reached its bare and boulder-strewn base. It
was perhaps three hundred feet high, of bare granite boulders heaped
one on the other, with big cavities between them, and all so rounded
and smooth that I had great difficulty in climbing it, but at length I
stood on the huge boulder poised on the summit. And from it, to my joy,
I saw glimmering away on the far northern horizon a wide stretch of
water. I rubbed my eyes and peered again and again, for often the false
mirage had raised my hopes to a frantic pitch by its glittering
deception. But this was water, and I could scarce refrain from setting
forth immediately in its direction, yet, knowing the exhausted state of
the horses I feared to do so, and seeking a hollow under a gigantic
boulder I lay through the heat of that long scorching day, parched and
longing for the water I had seen, dreaming of it when I dozed, and
gloating over it when awake. How I would revel in it; could I ever be
satisfied again to do aught but drink, and drink, and lay and soak my
sun-scorched body in it, and drink again?

Impatient as I was, the day seemed intolerably long, but at length the
sun was sufficiently low to allow of the horses trekking again,
although the poor beasts' plight was pitiful. Again I trekked through
the better part of the night, due north, and with no fear of missing
the water, for it was a wide sheet that the kopje had shown me almost a
lake it appeared to be.

Towards morning the horses were so exhausted that I could scarcely urge
them forward, and I myself but stumbled doggedly on, kept alive solely
by the knowledge that soon now I should drink.

And now, thank God, I could see the water faintly reflecting the light
in the east, and just as the sun rose I stumbled clear of the dunes.
Before me stretched a wide s