Under this discomfort, a predatory column was marching on from one captured village to another, whose possible store of ivory had so far not been gleaned. The road was the ordinary African bush-path, intensely winding and only foot-sole wide; the little army, with Kettle at its head, could only march in single file, and Clay, who brought up the straggling rear, sweated and panted quite half a mile behind his leader. Every one knew the tornado was approaching, and both the worn and haggard white men and the sweating, malodorous blacks hoped for it with equal intensity. For be it known that the tropical tornado passes through the stale baked air at intervals, like some gigantic sieve, dredging out its surplus heat and impurities. The which is a necessity of Nature; else even the black man could not endure in those regions. And in due time, though it lingered most cruelly in its approach, the tornado burst upon them, coming with an insane volley of rain and wind and sound, that filled the forests with crashings, and sent the parched earth flying in vicious mud-spirts. In a Northern country such a furious outburst would have filled people with alarm; but here, in the tropic wilderness, custom had robbed the tornado of its dignity; and no one was awed. Indeed the blacks fairly basked in its violence, turning their glistening bodies luxuriously under the great ropes of rain. The march stopped at the first outbreak of the squall. Kettle bolted to a rock ahead of him, and squatted down in a dry lee, sucking up great draughts of the new cool air. There are times when a drop of five degrees of temperature can bring earthly bliss of a quality almost unimaginable. And there he stayed, philosophically waiting till the tornado should choose to blow itself out. The wind had started with a roar and a sudden squall, reaching the full climax of its strength in a matter of thirty seconds, and then with equal hurry it ended, leaving the country it had scoured full of a fresh, cool, glistening calm. Kettle rose to his feet, shook his clothes into shape, and gave the order to start. The black soldiers stepped out in his wake, and for half a mile he strode at their head through the new-made mud of the path. But then he was suddenly brought up all standing. Word had been tediously handed down the long straggling line of men that there had been an accident in the rear; that a great tree had fallen to the blast; and finally that "dem dokitar, he lib for die." Swiftly Kettle turned, and worked his way back down the narrow lane of the path. The negroes he hustled against watched him with stupid stares, but he gave them little notice. Leaving out the facts that Clay was his only white companion and assistant, he had grown strangely to like the man, and the vague report of the accident filled him with more than dismay.