XLIV. 

 THE UNKNOWN LAND. 



C RETURNED the next day from V.'s 

 boma, bringing more potio and some 

 trade goods. We sent a good present back to 

 Naiokotuku, and prepared for an early start 

 into the new country. 



We marched out of the lower end of our elliptical 

 valley towards the miniature landscape we had 

 seen through the opening. But before we reached 

 it we climbed sharp to the right around the end 

 of the mountains, made our way through a low 

 pass, and so found ourselves in a new country 

 entirely. The smooth, undulating green-grass 

 plains were now superseded by lava expanses 

 grown with low bushes. It was almost exactly 

 like the sage-brush deserts of Arizona and New 

 Mexico the same coarse sand and lava footing, 

 the same deeply eroded barrancas, the same 

 scattered round bushes dotted evenly over the 



