they
would still be in the proportion of two to one; and if they once
penetrated the ranks of our friends, it would be all up with the little
band, as they would instantly be driven back by sheer weight of numbers,
into a ready-made watery grave of their own providing.

At dawn, therefore, the entire party breakfasted hastily, and, after
leaving in the outer cave a few articles likely to be of service to the
friendly old hermit, made their way quickly down the hill, and striking
well into the fog-banks at its foot, steered a straight course for the
distant mountains; Grenville and the other rescued white men, who were
extremely feeble, being carried by the Zanzibaris in hammocks, so as to
husband, as far as possible, what little strength they possessed.

The Zulu knew his ground thoroughly, and ere the mist had been
completely sucked up by the sun, had got his followers some miles on
their way, and travelling smoothly along the shallow bed of a small
stream, whose overhanging banks provided a capital safeguard against
prying eyes.

Naught of interest occurred that day, and by keeping the men hard at it,
so as to shorten the next day's journey, a good forty miles was knocked
off before the tired wayfarers lay down to snatch a brief spell of rest
until the tardy appearance of the moon provided them with sufficient
light to proceed by, when the little band again took the road and kept
moving until the waning light put a welcome period to their labours, and
sleeping a heavy, dreamless sleep until the sun once more awoke them to
the weary toil and travel of another burning tropic day.

A glorious sight now met the wondering eyes of our friends, for right
before them and distant perhaps a score of miles across the veldt, rose
the giant fabric of the wished-for mountain, now sharply defined in
every detail of its vast and massive grandeur. Straight up into the
very heavens themselves shot one glorious, glittering peak, whose
perfect beauty was beyond all earthly praise: around its lofty summit
the everlasting snows had grouped themselves like gleaming, flashing
jewels in the radiant crown of this mighty cloud-clad monarch of the
equator. Wreaths of filmy, fleecy mist drifted slowly here and there
across his distorted shoulders, which were seamed in every direction
with yawning fissures, whose awful blackness was rendered even more
striking by contrast with the unmatched, glittering glory of this
solitary inland peak, whi