Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1906-06-17

g.: e; :: 5: e.: +; !!
travel faster than two
miles an hour; so
just beyond the
@@@ hill, about three miles
out of town, when
unpacked, strapped our animals fore legs together
to prevent them from wandering back and lay down
in wet blankets for the first of many nights be-
meath dripping skies.
The next evening camped Pretoria,
twenty-five miles from Johannesburg, and in the
early morning again took up march The
veldts which encompassed US, reaching away to far
horizons every side, afforded wood for
cooking. Our meals consisted of canned beef,
dimes, and crackers. We anxious to reach
the bush country, where there would be fuel and
some shelter from the incessant downpour.
After three days of dreary plodding, with sodden
clouds above us and sticky mud beneath feet
we began to pass the low thorn-trees that marked
the southern outskirts of this vast bush region
little before shutdown to small but beat
tiful stream, where the ripping water grass grown
banks, and abundance of wood indicated that we had
found an ideal camping place. Anticipation of
hot supper after cold and soggy fare lent speed
to movements we unpacked the donkeys and
began preparations for the night, and in half
hour three of us were sitting by the fire waiting with
great impatience until Lawler, who acting as
cook, should bring us the cornell beef hash, hot
biscuits, and coffee, our finest meal since we had
been the trail. Nimmo a stawart youth who
was always hungry, took the first mouthful, which
he proceeded to get rid of with extreme haste
A Meal of Salt Biscuits
WHATS the matter?" we asked quickly, with
w heavily laden forks suspended in the air.
An salt, and nothing but salt. This stuff would
kill dog
An investigation proved that the nnocent-lookng
pretty little stream, that murmured playfully
the rocks, salty than the ocean. 1t was
dark by this time; but had to break camp and
trek weary miles before found sufficient water
for the night From that time
full to try the water before unpacked the
donkeys.
For eleven more days we struggled on, before the
adobe houses of Petersburg appeared in the dis
lance on the veldt which we had again come upon.
We had travelled, in the rain and mud, about two
hundred miles. Every day the heavens had poured
down much water that it was hard for to recall
how it felt to have dry skins and clothing. No
unusual adventure had relieved the monotony of
had met since leaving Pretoria isolated store
keepers, who traded with the Kafrs, and occasional
parties of Beers, who invariably warned against
the swollen rivers and other perils ahead. Off
the sides of the range of high hills paral-
Icing had at night the twinklng fires of the
Kairs, but none of these had us.
: We were not yet in the country of much big
A. game The only creatures of the jungle we had
M encountered were snakes that wi ggled off into
q the bush we approached along the faint trail,
NJ innumerable green parrots, and little monkeys,
u that swung eagerly from branch to branch of
the low trees to view u.s. and scurred when
advanced toward them. Jones shot and wound
ed of the little fellows, whose cries like
those of baby that from then of us could
be induced to pull trigger these pygmy children
of the forest.
We should have liked to tarry in Petersburg a
small town that owes its existence and prosperity
to the fertility of the surrounding country and the