sting once or twice for a few minutes. It
was found that Ghamba; in spite of his age, was an extremely good
walker; and when they halted at daylight, Langley was so done up that
he could not have held out for another half-hour. Whitson, the wiry,
had not yet felt the least fatigue.

This march had taken them to the very foot of the great Drakensberg
range, and they rested in a valley between two of its main spurs. Here
they remained all day, comfortably located in a sheltered nook, where
there was plenty of dry grass. Their resting place was encircled by
immense rocks. Although the surrounding country was desolate to a
degree, and neither a human being nor an animal was to be seen, Ghamba
would not hear of their lighting a fire nor leaving the spot where they
rested. The weather was clear, and neither too warm nor too cold. They
slept at intervals during the day, and at evening felt quite recovered
from their fatigue. At nightfall they again started, their course
leading steeply up the gorge in which they had rested. Although the
pathway became more and more indistinct, Ghamba appeared never to be at
a loss. Langley several times shuddered, when they passed by the very
edge of some immense precipice, or clambered along some steep mountain
side, where a false step would have meant destruction. He began to show
signs of fatigue soon after midnight, so at Ghamba's suggestion a
considerable portion of his load was transferred to the shoulders of
Whitson, who seemed to be as tireless as Ghamba himself.

At daybreak they halted in the depths of another tremendous gorge with
precipitous sides. The scenery in this particular area of the
Drakensberg range, the neighbourhood of the Mont aux Sources, is
indescribably grand and impressive, and is quite unlike anything else
in South Africa. Enormous and fantastically-shaped mountains are here
huddled together indiscriminately, and between them wind and double
deep gloomy gorges, along the bottoms of which mighty boulders are
thickly strewn. On dizzy ledge and steep slope dense thickets of wild
bamboo grow, and a few stunted trees fill some of the less deep clefts,
wherever the sunshine can penetrate. Splendid as is the scenery, its
gloom, its stillness, its naked crags and peaks, its dark depths that
seem to cleave to the very vitals of the earth, become so oppressive,
that after a few days spent amongst them, the traveler is filled with
repulsion and almost horror. Few living th