So we turned our backs reluctantly on that unknown oasis--which may indeed have been no oasis at all, and nothing more than a big pan similar to those we had examined--and toiled back to the coast. No matter how good a walker a man may be in the ordinary way, he will find the first few days’ walking in the dunes a most painful and exhausting experience. Wading through loose sand up to the ankle, climbing up it at a steep angle, and plunging down it on the other side of the dune, only to repeat the process, _ad infinitum_, exercise a terrific strain upon muscles scarcely called into play in ordinary walking; and ten miles a day across country like this is a severe strain upon a new hand at the game. With practice, of course, he can do double, and with experience he falls into a peculiar shuffling gait which is the most noticeable feature about the farmer and others who dwell in these sandy districts and who are nicknamed “Zand-trappers.” All of which Du Toit imparted to me as we walked back to the coast. “You lift your feet too high,” he said, “like these blooming Germans do when they’re goose-stepping. Walk like this.” I told him I should be sorry to, and he appeared annoyed; but I found that, though I could beat him easily on the hard flat, I stood no chance with him in the sand, and what I had always put down to bunions or sore feet was really this “zand-trapping” gait that he had acquired in his youth, and never got rid of. Most men who live among the sand wear low _veldtschoens_, without socks. These _schoen_ are easily kicked off and emptied of their accumulation of sand periodically; whilst many adopt the practice of cutting a small hole in the sole near the toe, through which they occasionally shake out the dusty contents. Ordinary boots last but very little time, as the sand has an extraordinary abrading action upon the leather, cutting the stitching holding sole and upper together in a few days. We got back and told Jim about what we had seen, and he put finality to the matter by declaring that if we were mad enough to try to reach the oasis we could walk back to Luderitzbucht with the diamonds, as he’d be “somethinged” if he’d wait for us! Moreover, he’d packed everything on to the cutter, and if we wanted to beat up to Walfish Bay and Cape Cross we’d better get on board at once. I had hoped for a good night’s rest that night, but instead, like a lamb to the slaughter, I was led to that wretched cutter, where again, to a modified extent, what Jim called my “sleeping-sickness” floored me. However, this time the weather was fine and the breeze was fair, and two days later we ran into Walfish Bay.