terribly hot, and he
hurriedly opened the little window for the breeze to pass through.

There was an alteration in the temperature at once, but he knew that was
not enough, and running to the door, he picked up a bucket, and called
for Tanta Sal, who came slowly.

"Baas Joe go die.--Jack?"

She pointed away over the plain, and Dyke nodded.

"Yes, Jack is coming. Go, quick! fetch water."

The woman understood, and taking the bucket, went off at once towards
where the cool spring gurgled among the rocks at the kopje.

The feeling of terrible horror and fear attacked Dyke again directly,
and he shrank from going to his brother's side, lest he should see him
pass away to leave him alone there in the desert; but a sensation of
shame came to displace the fear. It was selfish, he felt; and with a
new thought coming, he went to the back of the door, took down the great
heavy scissors with which he and Emson had often operated upon the
ostrich-feathers, cutting them off short, and leaving the quill stumps
in the birds' skins, where after a time they withered and fell out,
giving place to new plumes. Then kneeling down by the head of the rough
bed, he began to shear away the thick close locks of hair from about the
sick man's temples, so that the brain might be relieved of some of the
terrible heat.

This done, he went to the chest, and got out a couple of handkerchiefs.

His stay in that torrid clime had taught him much, but he had never
thought of applying a little physical fact to the purpose he now
intended. For he knew that if a bottle or jug of water were surrounded
by a wet cloth and kept saturated, either in a draught or in the sun,
the great evaporation which went on would cool the water within the
vessel.

"And if it will do this," Dyke thought, "why will it not cool poor Joe's
head?"

He bent down over him, and spoke softly, then loudly; but Emson was
perfectly unconscious, and wandering in his delirium, muttering words
constantly, but what they were Dyke could not grasp.

In a few minutes Tanta Sal re-appeared with the bucket of cool
spring-water.

"Baas Joe go die," she said, shaking her head as she set it down; and
then, without waiting to be told to go, she went round to the back, and
began to pile up fuel and fan the expiring fire, before proceeding to
make and bake a cake.

Meanwhile, Dyke had been busy enough. He had soaked one of the
handkerchiefs in the bucket, and laid it dripping righ