Then came the question;--"Can we take our wagons ?" "You will have to walk," was our answer, for no wagons could go over that unbroken road that we had traveled.

As rapidly and carefully as we could we told them of our journey, and the long distance between the water holes; that we had lost no time and yet had been twenty six days on the road; that for a long distance the country was about as dry and desolate as the region we had crossed east of this camp.

We told them of the scarcity of grass, and all the reasons that had kept us so long away from them.
We inquired after the others whom we had left in camp when we went away, and we were told all they knew about them.

Hardly were we gone before they began to talk about the state of affairs which existed.

They said that as they had nothing to live on but their oxen it would be certain death to wait here and eat them up, and that it would be much better to move on a little every day and get nearer and nearer the goal before the food failed.