We Were Not,
However, Destined To Take This Unfair Advantage Of The Enemy.
Just
as we had half crossed the distance, an ill-fated, abominable little
fragment of rock suddenly broke off,
And at its first bound away went
the herd like lightning over the precipitous rocks, and with a little
chirrupping noise like sparrows, were in a few seconds well out of
range of bullets. As the natives express it, "they became wind,"
and we were left behind our rock, looking, after all our toils, to
say the least of it, extremely foolish. A shot which I took at some
250 yards was more to relieve ourselves by making a noise than with
any hopes of bringing down one of the light-heeled little creatures,
for their bounding powers put all correctness of aim at that range
out of the question.
The next part of the programme was breakfast, but alas! there were
no signs in any direction of the bearer of our supplies, and I now
recollected that the rock which had so puzzled us would be quite
inaccessible to the coolie and his precious charge, without which
he himself was useless. All we could do was to ascend a high peak of
mountain, in hopes that the breakfast would ascend another, and that
we could then exchange signals of distress and obtain relief. However,
after reaching our look-out station, which took us some climbing,
we could discern nothing around us bearing the slightest resemblance
to a coolie, and our hopes began to descend below zero.
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