324 EXPEDITION INTO [Cmap. XXXVI. 



whelming host, which their heated imaginations 

 had conjured into existence — but from the empty 

 challenge of a woman, given from a position to 

 which, either on horseback or on foot, they could 

 have ascended without the smallest difficulty ! 



Completely frustrated in our endeavours to chas- 

 tise the authors of our heavy misfortunes, we at 

 length descended the hill in order to muster the 

 remnant of our ill-fated teams ; and little less 

 melancholy was the prospect that there awaited us. 

 Exclusive of the old cow, and the equally useless 

 black bull, neither of which were touched, seventeen 

 drooping wounded wretches, with glazed eyes, and 

 fallen crest, were huddled together — some shivering 

 in the last agonies of death — and many others 

 barely able to rise. In addition to sundry wounds 

 which had been inflicted by our merciless and ma- 

 licious foes whilst urging them across the plain, 

 the unfortunate animals had recently received many 

 cold-blooded gashes, bestowed, apparently, with 

 the design of rendering them unserviceable to us; 

 and, thus crippled, it was not without infinite labour 

 and difficulty that we eventually succeeded in 

 driving them to the camp, which we reached long 

 after the sun had sunk in the west. On our way 

 thither, visiting the demon kraal, we found a filthy 

 area, inclosed by masses of rock heaped together 

 by the hand of nature, and overgrown with wild 

 olives ; but inhabited only by meagre curs, which 

 had been left, by the vindictive sprites, to guard. 



