hose of the living. I could not endure
the thought of leaving Gibson's last resting-place unknown, although
Bunyan says, "Wail not for the dead, for they have now become the
companions of the immortals." As I have said, my mind could not rest
easy without making another attempt to discover Gibson; but now that
the Circus water was gone, it would be useless to go from here without
some other water between, for where we left his tracks was seventy
miles away, and by the time we could get back to them it would be time
to return. In the early part of the day we got sticks and logs, and
erected a portion of the smoke-house, while Jimmy got the horses. I
then determined to go with Mr. Tietkens to where he and Gibson had
found a rock-hole, which they said was unapproachable. I was
determined to see whether it could be used, so we delayed killing
another horse until our return, and in consequence we had to draw upon
our small stock of flour. In the afternoon we took five more horses,
intending to load them with water at the hole if possible; but I found
it utterly useless. I called the most western hill of this range Mount
Forrest, and the most western watercourse Forrest's Creek.

(ILLUSTRATION: JIMMY AT FORT MCKELLAR.)

When we arrived again at the fort, on Monday, I knew something had
happened, for Jimmy was most profuse in his delight at seeing us
again. It appeared that while we were preparing to start on Saturday,
a whole army of natives were hidden behind the rocks, immediately
above the camp, waiting and watching until we departed, and no sooner
were we well out of sight and sound, than they began an attack upon
poor Jim. According to him, it was only by the continued use of rifle
bullets, of which, fortunately, I had a good supply--and, goodness
knows, the ground in and around the fort was strewn with enough
discharged cartridges--that he could keep them at bay at all. If he
had killed ten per cent, for all the cartridges he fired away, I
should think he would have destroyed the whole tribe; but he appeared
to have been too flurried to have hit many of them. They threw several
spears and great quantities of stones down from the rocks; it was
fortunate he had a palisade to get inside of. Towards night he seems
to have driven them off, and he and the little dog watched all night.
It must indeed have been something terrible that would keep Jimmy
awake all night. Before daylight on Sunday the natives came to attack
him a