264 THROUGH UNKNOWN AFRICAN COUNTRIES. 
noises in the villages kept up all night, and to our relief 
the morning dawned without the enemy having made any 
advance. They were still shouting and blowing their war- 
horns while Dodson and I were eating our breakfast, but 
now the sounds began to come steadily nearer. 
Everything was in readiness for defence, so there was 
nothing for me to do but to light a cigarette and wait. 
Presently the naked forms emerged from the bushes, 
jumping and dancing about, as is the custom of savages. 
They intended to surround the camp, and consequently 
broke up into sections; but as they were within seventy 
yards of the camp we opened fire on them at once. They 
could not stand the firing more than a few minutes. 
Starting up some cry or other, they all started off toa 
plain on one side of the bushes, and there sat down and 
waited. We watched for a long time, and saw the natives 
separate into parties, which went into the bushes, leaving 
a small detachment on the plain. 
We did nothing for an hour, and as the natives did not 
change their positions, I concluded they were waiting for 
us to move first, so they could attack us on the march. 
This would have been very bad for us, so I decided to 
charge through the bushes with fifty men spread out in 
line, leaving Dodson with the rest of the boys to guard the 
camp. It was not very agreeable work to attack a body of 
four hundred and fifty warriors, all of them, as we thought, 
armed with poisoned arrows; for if they were to play their 
game well, and sneak behind bushes, from which they could 
shoot without being seen, they would surely wound many 
of us. However, my boys were full of courage, and marched 
as steadily and regularly as possible through the jungle. 
Every moment we expected to receive a shower of arrows. 
It got to be most exciting, wondering what our enemies 
would do, after we had tramped a quarter of an hour with- 
