100 
MUNGO PARK'S 
made their escape amongst the rocks, but without carrying 
away any of the asses, though they had untied the feet of 
three and fastened a fourth to a bush. Collected the asses 
and began to load. Whilst we were loading one of the 
asses strayed a little from the rest, about two hundred 
yards, and to my astonishment a man came from amongst 
the rocks, took off the load, and began to cut it open with 
his knife. Before any person could come at him, he left 
the load and run up the rocks. Mr. Scott and one of the 
soldiers fired at him, but did not hit him. Went on. Road 
very rocky. Told the soldiers to shoot the first that took 
any thing from the baggage. ^ Found some of the asses and 
loads lying at the difficult places in the road, and often 
two loads with only one half-sick soldier to guard them. 
Kept in the rear, as I perceived they had a mind to take 
some of the loads and asses. I saw the thieves peeping 
over the rocks, and making signs to their comrades, who 
seemed very desirous of assisting us in putting on our loads. 
Put one of the loads on my horse, and another on Mr. 
Anderson's, and luckily cleared the difficult passes of the 
rocks by sun set, without losing any thing, though sur- 
rounded by at least a dozen experienced thieves. When 
we reached the bottom of the rocky pass, we went on with 
more ease, and came up to the rest of the party about 
eight o'clock. They had stopped for the night in the 
