Rouse Mr.
Tietkens, get fresh horses and more water-bags, and return as soon as
you possibly can. I shall of course endeavour to get down the tracks
also."
(ILLUSTRATION: THE LAST EVER SEEN OF GIBSON.)
He then said if he had a compass he thought he could go better at
night. I knew he didn't understand anything about compasses, as I had
often tried to explain them to him. The one I had was a Gregory's
Patent, of a totally different construction from ordinary instruments
of the kind, and I was very loth to part with it, as it was the only
one I had. However, he was so anxious for it that I gave it him, and
he departed. I sent one final shout after him to stick to the tracks,
to which he replied, "All right," and the mare carried him out of
sight almost immediately. That was the last ever seen of Gibson.
I walked slowly on, and the further I walked the more thirsty I
became. I had thirty miles to go to reach the Kegs, which I could not
reach until late to-morrow at the rate I was travelling, and I did not
feel sure that I could keep on at that. The afternoon was very hot. I
continued following the tracks until the moon went down, and then had
to stop. The night was reasonably cool, but I was parched and choking
for water. How I longed again for morning! I hoped Gibson had reached
the Kegs, and that he and the mare were all right. I could not sleep
for thirst, although towards morning it became almost cold. How I
wished this planet would for once accelerate its movements and turn
upon its axis in twelve instead of twenty-four hours, or rather that
it would complete its revolution in six hours.
APRIL 24TH TO 1ST MAY.
(ILLUSTRATION: ALONE IN THE DESERT.)
So soon as it was light I was again upon the horse tracks, and reached
the Kegs about the middle of the day. Gibson had been here, and
watered the mare, and gone on. He had left me a little over two
gallons of water in one keg, and it may be imagined how glad I was to
get a drink. I could have drunk my whole supply in half an hour, but
was compelled to economy, for I could not tell how many days would
elapse before assistance could come: it could not be less than five,
it might be many more. After quenching my thirst a little I felt
ravenously hungry, and on searching among the bags, all the food I
could find was eleven sticks of dirty, sandy, smoked horse, averaging
about an ounce and a half each, at the bottom of a pack-bag. I was
rather staggered to find that I had little more than a pound weight of
meat to last me until assistance came. However, I was compelled to eat
some at once, and devoured two sticks raw, as I had no water to spare
to boil them in.
After this I sat in what shade the trees afforded, and reflected on
the precariousness of my position. I was sixty miles from water, and
eighty from food, my messenger could hardly return before six days,
and I began to think it highly probable that I should be dead of
hunger and thirst long before anybody could possibly arrive. I looked
at the keg; it was an awkward thing to carry empty. There was nothing
else to carry water in, as Gibson had taken all the smaller
water-bags, and the large ones would require several gallons of water
to soak the canvas before they began to tighten enough to hold water.
The keg when empty, with its rings and straps, weighed fifteen pounds,
and now it had twenty pounds of water in it. I could not carry it
without a blanket for a pad for my shoulder, so that with my revolver
and cartridge-pouch, knife, and one or two other small things on my
belt, I staggered under a weight of about fifty pounds when I put the
keg on my back. I only had fourteen matches.
After I had thoroughly digested all points of my situation, I
concluded that if I did not help myself Providence wouldn't help me. I
started, bent double by the keg, and could only travel so slowly that
I thought it scarcely worth while to travel at all. I became so
thirsty at each step I took, that I longed to drink up every drop of
water I had in the keg, but it was the elixir of death I was burdened
with, and to drink it was to die, so I restrained myself. By next
morning I had only got about three miles away from the Kegs, and to do
that I travelled mostly in the moonlight. The next few days I can only
pass over as they seemed to pass with me, for I was quite unconscious
half the time, and I only got over about five miles a day.
To people who cannot comprehend such a region it may seem absurd that
a man could not travel faster than that. All I can say is, there may
be men who could do so, but most men in the position I was in would
simply have died of hunger and thirst, for by the third or fourth
day - I couldn't tell which - my horse meat was all gone. I had to
remain in what scanty shade I could find during the day, and I could
only travel by night.
When I lay down in the shade in the morning I lost all consciousness,
and when I recovered my senses I could not tell whether one day or two
or three had passed.
