o our
horses. They recognised me at once, and apparently described to the other
natives, the circumstances under which they had met me, lamenting most
pathetically the death of the horses; the dead bodies of which they had
probably seen in their route to the water. Upon examining their weapons
they shewed us several that were headed with flint, telling us that they
procured it to the north-west, thus confirming my previous conjectures as
to the existence of flint in that direction. To our inquiries about
water, they still persisted that there was none inland, and that it took
them five days, from where we were, to travel to that at the head of the
Bight. No other, they said, existed in any direction near us, except a
small hole to the north-west, among some sand hills, about two miles off;
these they pointed out, and offered to go with me and shew me the place
where the water was. I accepted the offer, and proceeded to the
sand-drifts, accompanied by one of them. On our arrival he shewed me the
remains of a large deep hole that had been dug in one of the sandy flats;
but in which the water was now inaccessible, from the great quantity of
sand that had drifted in and choked it up. By forcing a spear down to a
considerable depth, the native brought it out moist, and shewed it me to
prove that he had not been deceiving me. I now returned to the camp, more
than ever disposed to credit what I had been told relative to the
interior. I had never found the natives attempt to hide from us any
waters that they knew of, on the contrary, they had always been eager and
ready to point them out, frequently accompanying us for miles, through
the heat and amongst scrub, to shew us where they were. I had, therefore,
no reason to doubt the accuracy of their statements when they informed me
that there was none inland! Many different natives, and at considerable
intervals of country apart, had all united in the same statement, and as
far as I had yet been able to examine so arid a country personally, my
own observations tended to confirm the truth of what they had told me.

In the evening several of the natives went down with the men to water the
horses, and when there drank a quantity of water that was absolutely
incredible, each man taking from three to four quarts, and this in
addition to what they got at the camp during the earlier part of the day.
Strange that a people who appear to do with so little water, when
traversing the deserts,