1 10 By Mountain, Lake, and Plain 



this much. Any attempt to get nearer than this 

 would cause a renewal of their headlong flight; 

 they would again be swallowed up by the desert 

 and all would have to begin again. So we main- 

 tain parallel courses. 



On the horizon there is a white streak that 

 almost looks like water. In the vernacular it is 

 called a daJcJc, a salt lake either in process of 

 being dried up or completely so. If the former, 

 an apparently firm white surface may turn out 

 to be a peculiarly treacherous quagmire ; if the 

 latter, you may find the surface light and powdery 

 with blisters and leprous patches of white, or 

 hard and smooth like plaster of Paris. It may 

 even be solid salt ; but in all cases it is flat, a 

 place a rat could not pass unseen, and affording 

 to gazelle as sure a refuge as perpendicular cliffs 

 to wild goats. It is tolerably certain the herd 

 will either make for the dakk or for the broken 

 ground at the foot of the distant hills. Now 

 they are going quietly, but leading the herd 

 by some fifty yards is a doe of the "straight- 

 necked" kind I seem to recognise, that with 

 tail cocked the danger signal 1 goes on and on 



1 A very unmistakable signal too. The tail when down forms 

 a vertical black stripe down the white " caudal disc." When the 

 tail is raised, the white circle is complete. It is comparable to the 

 old signal for a "bull " and a "magpie." 



