first dawn of light appeared in
the east, and Mr. Hardy at once roused the sleepers.

He then gave them a brief account of the conclusions to which he had
arrived in the night, and of his reason for so doing. There was a
general expression of agreement, then the girths were tightened, and in
five minutes the troop was in motion.

How great was the change since the preceding evening! Then, as far as
the eye could reach stretched a plain of waving grass. Birds had called
to their mates, coveys of game had risen at their approach; deer had
been seen bounding away in the distance; ostriches had gazed for an
instant at the unusual sight of man, and had gone off with their heads
forward and their wings out-stretched before the wind.

Now, the eye wandered over a plain of dingy black, unbroken by a single
prominence, undisturbed by living creatures except themselves. As Hubert
remarked to his father, 'It looked as if it had been snowing black all
night.'

Both men and horses were anxious to get over these dreary plains, and
the pace was faster, and the halts less frequent, than they had been the
day before.

It was fortunate that the fire had not taken place at an earlier hour of
the evening, as the horses would have been weakened by want of food. As
it was, they had had five hours to feed after their arrival.

Both men and horses, however, suffered much from thirst; and the former
had good reason to congratulate themselves on having filled every
water-skin at the first halting-place of the preceding day. Clouds of
black impalpable dust rose as they rode along. The eyes, mouth, and
nostrils were filled with it, and they were literally as black as the
ground over which they rode.

Twice they stopped and drank, and sparingly washed out the nostrils and
mouths of the horses, which was a great relief to them, for they
suffered as much as did their masters, as also did Dash, who, owing to
his head being so near the ground, was almost suffocated; indeed, Hubert
at last dismounted, and took the poor animal up on to the saddle before
him.

At last, after four hours' steady riding, a gleam of colour was seen in
the distance, and in another quarter of an hour they reached the unburnt
plains, which, worn and parched as they were, looked refreshing indeed
after the dreary waste over which they had passed.

The Guachos, after a consultation among themselves, agreed in the
opinion that the little stream of which they had spoken