HAJEK-EL-HAMIS 203 



wish him to know just where they were. She cast 

 about for other motives, and presently it struck her 

 that a white man, quite alone, as he seemed to be, 

 would appear to the natives an easy victim ; and she 

 remembered how the French authorities had warned 

 us not to go farther east than Hajer - el - Hamis. 

 Every year one or two white men to the east of the 

 lake had been murdered, and perhaps the recent fight- 

 ing in Wadai had aroused fanatical tendencies farther 

 west. 



I had ridden on ahead, and all this while Mrs Talbot 

 was alone, but now I returned to join her, and she told 

 me what she had seen. Frankly nervous, we chanced 

 her husband's wrath and rode forward to seek him, 

 for by this time both he and his pursuers were out 

 of sight. We found him coming towards us, in com- 

 plete ignorance of what had occurred, and no more 

 was seen of the suspicious huntsmen. 



We persuaded him not to hunt again while in that 

 neighbourhood, and we all kept together, for as we 

 rode we heard the beat of drums tapping out the 

 news of our approach from one village to another, 

 and the few people we passed were surly and 

 unfriendly. 



The character of country now changed, and from 

 open tracts we passed into low tangled woods that 

 shut from our sight the hills of Hajer-el- Hamis, 

 which, when we first saw them in the dim distance, 

 we had taken for a cloud of smoke rising above the 

 trees. 



The mimosa wood closed in, and branches stretched 

 out from either side, and caught hold of us as we 

 forced our way along the narrow path that traversed 



