SEND BACK FOR WATER. 
341 
March 19. — To-day we travelled onwards for 
twenty-six miles, through a country exactly similar 
to that we had passed through yesterday. At three 
in the afternoon we halted at an opening where 
there was abundance of grass, though dry and wi- 
thered. The indications of natives having recently 
passed still continued, and confirmed me in my im- 
pression, that they were on a journey to the west- 
ward, and from one distant water to another, and 
principally for the purpose of gathering the fruit. 
We were now forty miles from the last water, and 
I became assured that we had very far to go to the 
next ; I had for some time given over any hope of 
finding the second water spoken of by the natives 
at the head of the Bight, and considered that we 
must have passed it if it existed, long ago, perhaps 
even in that very valley, or among those very sand- 
hills where we had searched so unsuccessfully on the 
12th. There was now the prospect of a long jour- 
ney before us without water, as we had brought 
only a little with us for ourselves, and which was 
nearly exhausted, whilst our horses had been quite 
without, and were already suffering from thirst. 
Consulting with the overseer, I resolved to leave 
our baggage where we were, whilst the horses were 
sent back to the water (forty miles) to rest and re- 
cruit for three or four days ; by this means I 
expected they would gather strength, and as they 
would have but little weight to carry until they 
reached our present position, when they returned 
