The country soon reverted to something like its normal appearance.
The bush fires were extinguished, and even my lagoon came into existence again.
Talking about bush fires, we often saw them raging madly and sublimely in the mountains.

They would burn for weeks at a stretch, and devastate hundreds of miles of country.

For ourselves, we always prepared for such emergencies by "ringing" our dwelling--that is to say, laying bare a certain stretch of country in a perfect circle around us.

Often we were almost choked by the intense heat which the wind occasionally wafted to us, and which, combined with the blazing sun and scarcity of water, rendered life positively intolerable.
I now wish to say a few words about Bruno--a few last sorrowful words--because at this period he was growing feeble, and, indeed, had never been the same since the death of Gibson.

Still, I was constantly making use of his sagacity to impress the blacks.