n this search up as
hopeless. We must; yes, allemaghte! we must try again."

We strolled after breakfast, taking our pipes with us, to the
chimney-like _cul-de-sac_ where Tobias Steenkamp's footprints had been
last seen, four years before. The place looked more than ever dark,
narrow, and forbidding; and as we stood upon the sandy floor of the
ravine and gazed upward to the faint patch of sky showing between the
cliffs, two hundred feet above, the sharp contrast made it yet more
awesome. For half an hour we looked about us, examining carefully every
cranny and projection within our vision. Suddenly a boyish expedient of
mine flashed into my mind. I had in my young days in Derbyshire
ascended a steep and very narrow fissure in a cliff among my native
dales, by copying faithfully the example of a sweep's boy, whom I had
watched climbing the great kitchen chimney. Why not make the attempt
here? It looked a tremendous risk, but still it might be accomplished
up in the far corner where the cliff-walls ran but a foot or two apart.
I had hazarded my limbs many a time as a boy in search of birds' nests:
why not here in pursuit of this mystery which so strangely baffled us?
I told my plan to Du Plessis; he evidently thought very little of it.
However, as we strolled back to camp, I thought out and discussed my
scheme, and, so far as I could, prepared for it in the afternoon. We
had at the wagons a long coil of stout rope some one hundred and fifty
feet in length. It seemed too short for my purpose, and I fastened to
it, therefore, with the greatest care, another seventy feet of strong ox
_riems_--halters of raw hide--carefully lashed one to the other. I thus
had over two hundred feet of rope.

Next morning, after a long night's rest, Du Plessis and I set off for
the ravine, taking with us our most useful native servant, Andries, one
of the drivers. I carried about my person some _billtong_ (dried meat),
matches, a revolver, hunting-knife, and a flask of brandy. Du Plessis
was equipped (save for the revolver) in the same manner. Arrived at the
extremity of the ravine, we threw down the rope, one end of which I
attached to my waist I wore, as usual, only my flannel shirt and a pair
of moleskin trousers, and upon my feet I had a pair of _velschoens_--
Boer field-shoes, made of strong yet soft leather of home-tanned hide.
These shoes were close-fitting, light, and pliable, and exactly suited
my purpose.

I now made m