under the circumstances was quite impossible, and I lay brooding sadly over my frustrated plans and my final disappointment. The snorting of the hippopotamuses in the water, and the cry of the herons, were the only sounds that broke the stillness.
Before midnight some small dark clouds arose, and gradually overspread the heavens, till not a star was to be seen. To my exhausted system the sultriness became more than ever trying, and the hours wore away without affording me the least refreshment.
Soon after sunrise we resumed our journey down the stream, but the slovenly and care-for-naught way in which the boatmen handled the baggage, and the general tone of their behaviour, warned me what I had to expect. The more I hurried them, the slower they went, and after a while, finding that a slight breeze was getting up, they pulled up all of a sudden at a sandbank, and declared that they would not proceed another inch.
I promised them beads, I threatened them with punishment from Sepopo, my servants blustered and stormed; but it was all to no purpose, the men only laughed; some of them went away and laid themselves down to sleep on the sand; others remained where they were, and appeared to chuckle over my weakness, enjoying the helplessness of my condition. This was a state of things that I was not disposed to allow. The remedy was not far to find. I was quite aware that the Marutse people were acquainted with very few guns better than the old musket. Taking my seat at the bow of my boat, I began handling my breechloader. After letting it flash for a few minutes in the sun, I took aim at a reed-
