The Indian Assured Me
That If We Could Push On We Would, By Next Evening, Come To A
Beautiful Lake In The Mountains:
So, ere the sun rose next morning,
we were in the saddle on our journey to the coveted water.
All that day we plodded along painfully, silently. Our lips were
dried together, and our tongues swollen. Thirst hurts! The horses
hung their heads and ears, and we were compelled to dismount and go
afoot. The poor creatures were getting so thin that our weight seemed
to crush them to the earth. The sun again set, darkness fell, and the
lake was, for all I could see, a dream of the chief, our guide. At
night, after repeating the sucking of the dew, we ate a little, drank
the blood of an animal, and tried to sleep. The patient horses stood
beside us with closed eyes and bowed heads, until the sight was more
than I could bear. Fortunately, a very heavy dew fell, which greatly
helped us, and two hours before sunrise next morning the loads were
equally distributed on the backs of the seven horses and we started
off once again through the mist for water! water! When the sun
illuminated the heavens and lit up the rugged peaks of the strangely
shaped mountains ahead of us, hope was revived. We sucked the fruit
of the date palm, and in imagination bathed and wallowed in the
water - beautiful water - we so soon expected to behold. The poor
horses, however, not buoyed up with sweet hopes as we were, gave out,
one after the other, and we were compelled to cruelly urge them on up
the steep.
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