A BED IN THE SAND 95 



spot on our body-politic, of this to change 

 the metaphor roaring malestrom-mill into 

 the hopper of which so large a proportion of 

 the youth of our country is flung? 



But in the nights that are coming, when the 

 rock-python pursues the coney along the 

 shattered pediments of the " Corner House," 

 the unchanging desert will lie, still void under 

 the abiding scrutiny of the stars. Bushman- 

 land can never alter. 



The fire dimmed and died. One by one my 

 companions sank into slumber. The horses 

 were resting, except unquiet Bucephalus, 

 who stamped and whinnied at intervals. The 

 oxen lay tethered to their yokes. Ever and 

 anon one of them uttered the deep, pathetic 

 bovine sigh, that suspiration which seems to 

 express perplexed resignation to the selfish 

 dominance of man, to that hopeless slavery 

 which is the doom of the once-lordly bovine 

 race. 



I seized my kaross and climbed the steep 

 side of the nearest dune-tentacle. Then I 

 laboured along its soft, sinuous surface to- 

 wards the gross, inert body of Typhon, until 

 far beyond the reach of camp-sounds. In the 

 yielding sand I made a lair. In this I laid me 

 down apparently the only waking thing in 



