I lay on a sofa for the remainder of the day and during all the night, suffering great pain. There was no surgeon within some hundred miles of us, and the surgical knowledge of the natives was of a very limited description. Mr Fordyce and Nowell did their best for me, and kept continually fomenting the limb with cold applications of vinegar and water, by which the swelling was somewhat abated. The skin, however, was much broken, and soon became of a bright purple hue. I felt somewhat alarmed, but Dango begged that I would allow him to apply a balsam composed of what I was told was margosse oil. The odour was as disagreeable as that of asafoetida, but not only did it keep all flies away, but it had a most healing and cooling effect, so that after the rest of another day I was able to mount my horse and proceed on our journey. Nowell passed the time by going out and shooting pea-fowl, partridges, and small deer, which added considerably to our bill of fare at dinner time. During three days after this, we travelled through the dense forest country I have before described. Though nothing could be more sombre or gloomy compared to the bright and open plain we had sometimes traversed, I was thankful for the shade and coolness we obtained, as the heat might again have inflamed my injured leg, I felt at first as if I had had a lump of lead hanging on one side of my horse, but by walking a little every day, that sensation gradually wore off, and in less than a week I was as well as ever. "You did well in destroying the elephants who were committing depredations on our friends' fields, but I cannot allow you to undertake, as knight-errants, to attack the rogues infesting all the villages we pass through," observed Mr Fordyce. "You will certainly get expended yourselves, if you make the attempt." Nowell was rather annoyed at this, as he, not having had the severe lesson I had got, was still eager for more elephant-shooting. While Mr Fordyce was speaking, we were approaching the spot where we proposed pitching our tent, near one of the many tanks I have mentioned, now, in most instances, in a sadly ruined condition. Suddenly our ears were assailed by a wild and mournful cry. "What can that be?" I asked. "Some human being in pain," answered Mr Fordyce, pressing on his horse in the direction from whence the sound came.