of deadly need men could die at arm's
length of plenty, sooner than touch food they did not know. In vain the
interpreters interpreted; in vain his two policemen showed in vigorous
pantomime what should be done. The starving crept away to their bark and
weeds, grubs, leaves, and clay, and left the open sacks untouched. But
sometimes the women laid their phantoms of children at Scott's feet,
looking back as they staggered away.

Faiz Ullah opined it was the will of God that these foreigners should
die, and it remained only to give orders to burn the dead. None the less
there was no reason why the Sahib should lack his comforts, and Faiz
Ullah, a campaigner of experience, had picked up a few lean goats and
had added them to the procession. That they might give milk for the
morning meal, he was feeding them on the good grain that these imbeciles
rejected. "Yes," said Faiz Ullah; "if the Sahib thought fit, a little
milk might be given to some of the babies"; but, as the Sahib well knew,
babies were cheap, and, for his own part, Faiz Ullah held that there was
no Government order as to babies. Scott spoke forcefully to Faiz Ullah
and the two policemen, and bade them capture goats where they could find
them. This they most joyfully did, for it was a recreation, and many
ownerless goats were driven in. Once fed, the poor brutes were willing
enough to follow the carts, and a few days' good food--food such as
human beings died for lack of--set them in milk again.

"But I am no goatherd," said Faiz Ullah. "It is against my izzat [my
honour]."

"When we cross the Bias River again we will talk of izzat," Scott
replied. "Till that day thou and the policemen shall be sweepers to the
camp, if I give the order."

"Thus, then, it is done," grunted Faiz Ullah, "if the Sahib will have it
so"; and he showed how a goat should be milked, while Scott stood over
him.

"Now we will feed them," said Scott; "twice a day we will feed them";
and he bowed his back to the milking, and took a horrible cramp.

When you have to keep connection unbroken between a restless mother of
kids and a baby who is at the point of death, you suffer in all your
system. But the babies were fed. Each morning and evening Scott would
solemnly lift them out one by one from their nest of gunny-bags under
the cart-tilts. There were always many who could do no more than
breathe, and the milk was dropped into their toothless mouths drop by
drop, with due pauses when th