said Considine.

"Your horse is fresher than mine," said Hans, "and you are lighter than
I am--go first. If there is water, hail me--if not, I will wait your
return."

With a nod of assent the youth pushed forward, gained the rock, and
found the place where water had once been, a dry hole!

For a few minutes he stood gazing languidly on the plain beyond the
ridge. Despair had almost taken possession of his breast, when his eye
suddenly brightened. He observed objects moving far away on the plain.
With bated breath he stooped and shaded his eyes with his hand. Yes,
there could be no doubt about it--a party of horsemen and
bullock-waggons! He tried to cheer, but his dry throat refused to act.
Turning quickly, he began to descend the hillside, and chanced to cough
as he went along. Instantly he was surrounded by almost a hundred
baboons, some of gigantic size, which came fearlessly towards him. They
grunted, grinned, and sprang from stone to stone, protruding their
mouths and drawing back the skin of their foreheads, threatening an
instant attack. Considine's gun was loaded, but he had lived long
enough in those regions to be fully aware of the danger of wounding one
of these creatures in such circumstances. Had he done so he would
probably have been torn to pieces in five minutes. He therefore kept
them off with the muzzle of his gun as he continued the descent. Some
of them came so near as to touch his hat while passing projecting rocks.
At last he reached the plain, where the baboons stopped and appeared to
hold a noisy council as to whether they should make a great assault or
not. He turned and levelled his gun.

"Come," thought he at that moment, "don't do it, Charlie. You have
escaped. Be thankful, and leave the poor brutes alone."

Obeying the orders of his conscience, he re-shouldered his gun and
returned to his friend, whom he found reclining under a low bush, and
informed him of what he had seen. The young Dutchman jumped up at once,
and, mounting, rode round a spur of the hill and out upon the plain. In
an hour they had overtaken their comrades, but great was their dismay on
finding that they had long ago consumed every drop of water, and that
they were suffering from thirst quite as much as themselves.

"Never mind," said Lucas Van Dyk; "let me comfort you with the assurance
that we shall certainly reach water in a few hours."

The hunter was right. Some hours before sunset the oxen and