John had every reason to be satisfied when he took stock of the results of the action. The enemy had been thoroughly routed, with considerable loss: he had no men killed, and only a few with superficial flesh wounds. But he looked grave enough when, at dinner-time, Ferrier confessed that he had already had to put the men on half rations. "Our only hope is that the enemy have had enough of it and will clear off," he said. "The ’bad men,’ at any rate, won’t think much of their job." "And Juma himself has had a reminder that won’t leave him for a few days. But if they _don’t_ clear off----" "We must wait and see. There ought to be plenty of fish in this pool; couldn’t we try a little angling?" "What about hooks?" "Well, there are some empty condensed milk-tins; we can make some sort of hooks out of them. And as for bait--I say, look there!" Two vultures were swooping down upon the western end of the island. "Sickening!" said Ferrier, with a shudder. "I’ll go and pot them and get the men to attend to things there. The birds will give us bait, and the men may like to eat them--I couldn’t." Several large hooks were made out of milk-tins. A piece of rope was unravelled to form lines, and several of the men were soon sitting on the causeway, angling with portions of the vultures which Ferrier shot. In the course of an hour or two they caught several fish, large and small; but the total quantity was insignificant in comparison with what was needed to give all a full meal. They were all rather hungry when they settled down for the night, and the white men devoutly hoped that when morning dawned they would see that the enemy’s force had broken up. In this they were disappointed. Daylight showed them parties of negroes hovering on the outskirts of the wood. That their intention was to resume their old tactics of watching the fort was proved before the day was over. A long line of women was observed coming from the north, bending under heavy loads. "Grub for them," said Ferrier. "They’re short, like us: but they can draw on the village while we starve." "I wonder if we could intercept a convoy," suggested John. "Very risky: practically impossible. We couldn’t tell when it’s coming. We might have to wait a day or two, and miss it after all. Besides, we might be cut off; they’re strong enough to keep us out if they get between us and the fort; and the garrison would be so much weakened that they couldn’t hold out against a general attack. No: we mustn’t think of it." "Well, it looks as if we must either break out or starve. We may starve in any case. We didn’t pass a single cultivated field on the way up, and if we made a dash for home we should have to depend on game and what wild fruits we could pick up. I don’t know what on earth we can do, that’s a fact."