, including some eighteen hundred pounds of ivory,
in charge of the villagers.

Of the last three weeks of this long trek, nine days were consumed in
forced marches through sterile country, bordering a wide and--according
to Mafuta--utterly impassable desert, during which both water and grass
were so exceedingly scarce that the entire party suffered terrible
privation, no game of any kind being seen, where more than half the oxen
died, while the remainder were reduced to such a miserable condition
that they were scarcely able to drag the now more than half-empty wagon.
Presently the character of the country gradually changed, a water-hole
or two were found, with small patches of fairly nutritious grass growing
round them, and as soon as a favourable spot was reached the wagon was
outspanned and the oxen allowed a couple of days' holiday in which to
rest and recuperate. Then Grosvenor and Dick, mounting their horses,
which had been spared as much as possible during the preceding ten days,
set off with their rifles in search of game, and eventually succeeded in
finding and shooting a pair of bush buck wherewith to replenish their
larder.

At the end of the second day's rest Mafuta--who had by this time
completely won the confidence of the two leaders of the expedition, and
had attained rather to the position of a humble comrade than a mere
follower--gave it as his opinion that the oxen had now sufficiently
recovered to justify the party in resuming their journey; and
accordingly on the following morning the animals were once more
inspanned. Dick and Grosvenor had already seen enough of the
surrounding country during their two days' foraging expedition to have
come to the conclusion that conditions would now improve with every mile
of progress, and this conclusion was fully borne out by their first
day's experiences, the country gradually becoming more hilly and broken,
with small watercourses occurring at steadily decreasing intervals, with
more and richer grass at every mile of their progress, until by the end
of the day they once more found themselves in a district that might
fairly be termed fertile, while a few head of game--bucks and a brace of
paow (a kind of bustard)--had been seen. All this was exceedingly
encouraging to the two explorers, for their experiences thus far--with
one very important exception--had been in strict accordance with
Menzies' story, as repeated to them by their friend Mitchell, and
conf