The reason for our strangely chopping wind now became apparent.  From our elevation we could see piled thunder-clouds looming up from the west.  They were spreading upward and outward in the swift, rushing manner of tropic storms; and I saw I must hustle if I was to get my fire going at all.  The first little blaze was easy, and after that I had to pile on quantities of any wood I could lay my hands to.  The deluge blotted out every vestige of daylight and nearly drowned out my fire.  I had started to help C. with the roan, but soon found that I had my own job cut out for me, and so went back to nursing my blaze.  The water descended in sheets.  We were immediately soaked through, and very cold.  The surface of the ground was steep and covered with loose round rocks, and in my continuous trips for firewood I stumbled and slipped and ran into thorns miserably.[30]

After a long interval of this the lanterns came bobbing through the darkness, and a few moments later the dim light revealed the shining rain-soaked faces of our men.

We wasted no time in the distribution of burdens.  C. with one of the lanterns brought up the rear, while I with the other went on ahead.

Now as Kongoni had but this minute completed the round trip to camp, we concluded that he would be the best one to give us a lead.  This was a mistake.  He took us out of the hills well enough, and a good job that was, for we could not see the length of our arms into the thick, rainy blackness, and we had to go entirely by the slants of the country.  But once in the more open, sloping country, with its innumerable bushy or wooded ravines, he began to stray.  I felt this from the first; but Kongoni insisted strongly he was right, and in the rain and darkness we had no way of proving him wrong.  In fact I had no reason for thinking him wrong; I only felt it.  This sense of direction is apparently a fifth wheel or extra adjustment some people happen to possess.  It has nothing to do with acquired knowledge, as is very well proved by the fact that in my own case it acts only as long as I do not think about it.  As soon as I begin consciously to consider the matter I am likely to go wrong.  Thus many, many times I have back-tracked in the dark over ground I had traversed but once before, and have caught myself turning out for bushes or trees I could not see, but which my subconscious memory recalled.  This would happen only when I would think of something besides the way home.  As soon as I took charge, I groped as badly as the next man.  It is a curious and sometimes valuable extra, but by no means to be depended upon.

Now, however, as I was following Kongoni, this faculty had full play, and it assured me vehemently that we were wrong.  I called C. up from the rear for consultation.  Kongoni was very positive he was right; but as we had now been walking over an hour, and camp should not have been more than three miles from where we had killed the roan, we were inclined towards my instinct.  So we took the compass direction, in order to assure consistency at least, and struck off at full right angles to the left.