260 
TEAVELS m CENTEAL AFEICA. 
dilapidated settlements^, also a few scattered uninhabited huts in the 
neighbourhood of corn-fields_, constructed^ I imagine,, for temporary 
convenience during the cultivation of the ground. Granite again 
protruded through the sandstone^ and in the course of half an hour 
we found ourselves wending our way amongst a number of bold 
granite hillocks^ rising in various directions above the forest. The 
heat was intense,, the atmosphere dry and clear^ with slight puffs of 
wind from the eastward. The march was most trying to myself 
and several of the invalided men ; therefore^ profiting by the neigh- 
bourhood of a village and a few shady trees^ we halted for the re- 
mainder of the day. The aborigines had all fled to a group of 
isolated rocks^ from a hundred and fifty to two hundred feet in 
height, some six hundred yards to the westward of us. By the aid 
of my glasses I could make out the women, bearing baskets, 
doubtless containing meat and grain ; so it appeared evident they 
liad prepared themselves for a temporary absence from their huts. 
The men, as usual all armed, sat in groups, exposed to the sun, 
apparently regardless of the heat, anxiously watching our move- 
ments. Protected by the shade of a large tree, stood several men, 
one of whom, clothed with a large hide, I fancied might be the 
chief. To him I sent two negro lads in our service, to invite him 
and his party, by signs, to our temporary quarters on a rock shel- 
tered from the sun by the thick foliage of a heglig tree. The lads 
walked boldly up to within flfty yards of the group, when the 
natives, apparently uneasy at the approach of our harmless mes- 
sengers, warned them off, the man with the hide taking a con- 
spicuous part, pointing onwards with outstretched arms to the 
direction of our route, then to his stomach, and going through a 
number of indescribable movements, plainly indicative of their 
scarcity of food and incapacity to succour us. The boys, on the 
