too apparent.  “While there’s life there’s hope,” and every day took us nearer to water—­that is if we were to get any at all!  So long as we could do so, we must take Tommy with us, who might yet be saved.  This, however, was not to be, for on the 28th we again encountered sand-ridges, running at right angles to our course, and these proved too hard for the poor brave brumby.  About midday he at last gave in, and with glazed eyes and stiff limbs he fell to the ground.  Taking off the saddle he carried, I knelt by his head for a few minutes and could see there was no hope.  Poor, faithful friend!  I felt like a murderer in doing it, but I knew it was the kindest thing—­and finished his sufferings with a bullet.  There on the ridge, his bones will lie for many a long day.  Brave Tommy, whose rough and unkempt exterior covered a heart that any warhorse might have envied, had covered 135 miles, without feed worth mentioning, and with only eleven gallons of water during that distance, a stage of nearly seven days’ duration of very hard travelling indeed, with the weather pretty sultry, though the nights were cool.  His death, however, was in favour of our water supply, which was not too abundant.  So much had been lost by the bags knocking about on the saddle, by their own pressure against the side of the saddle, and by evaporation, that we had to content ourselves with a quart-potful between us morning and evening—­by no means a handsome allowance.

On the 29th, after travelling eight hours through scrubs, we were just about to camp when the shrill “coo-oo” of a black-fellow met our ears; and on looking round we were startled to see some half-dozen natives gazing at us.  Jenny chose at that moment to give forth the howl that only cow-camels can produce; this was too great a shock for the blacks, who stampeded pell-mell, leaving their spears and throwing-sticks behind them.  We gave chase, and, after a spirited run, Luck managed to stop a man.  A stark-naked savage this, and devoid of all adornment excepting a waist-belt of plaited grass and a “sporran” of similar material.  He was in great dread of the camels and not too sure of us.  I gave him something to eat, and, by eating some of it myself, put him more at ease.  After various futile attempts at conversation, in which Luck displayed great knowledge of the black’s tongue, as spoken a few hundred miles away near Eucla, but which unfortunately was quite lost on this native, we at last succeeded in making our wants understood.  “Ingup,” “Ingup,” he kept repeating, pointing with his chin to the North and again to the West.  Evidently “Ingup” stood for water; for he presently took us to a small granite rock and pointed out a soak or rock-hole, we could not say which.  Whilst we stooped to examine the water-hole, our guide escaped into the scrub and was soon lost to view.  Near the rock we found his camp.  A few branches leaning against a bush formed his house.  In front a fire was burning, and near it a plucked bird lay ready