With what amount of patience I should have awaited the return of the water-carrier I do not know, but just at this juncture one of my porters arrived, and threw down his burden with a weary sigh. I remembered with joy the contents of the lumpy sack he bore, and rapidly untying its mouth took from it several cocoanuts. Filling a gourd with their milk, I was able to assuage the thirst of myself and my servant, who had returned to consciousness, and we then passed with equanimity the half-hour that elapsed before Mabruki came back from his quest among the rocks of Maungu, bearing gourds full of delicious water, clear and cool. At this camping-place we remained until the afternoon of the next day, awaiting the coming in of all the laggards; but my patience was at last overtaxed, and I resolved to go on with a few followers to Ndara, the next camping-spot, where we should be in an inhabited country, and with pleasanter surroundings, for the vegetation in the vicinity of Maungu was singularly forbidding and ugly, suggesting some enchanted forest, and, moreover, the water-supply proved scanty and difficult of access. I left my head-man and a few followers to search for the missing men, and walked on to Ndara through the moonlight, stopping to sleep for a few hours before dawn. In the early morning we began to ascend and cross a rocky ridge, and on surmounting it looked out westward over the plains or mountain plateaux of Taita. Here our sight was gladdened by clumps of really green and shady trees, and we were further delighted by the first signs of evident cultivation. Further on we met some natives, ugly, nearly naked, and very black, with huge rings of beads in their wide-lobed ears, and greeting them with effusive friendliness we induced them to follow us to our camp with a few eatables (sweet potatoes and corn-cobs principally), feeling in our delight at once more reaching habitable country an amiable desire to be on the best of terms with its inmates. We pitched the tent at the foot of Ndara Hill, near a pool of dirty water, whither large flocks of cattle came to drink. In this not unpicturesque country of rocks and forest trees and lovely wild flowers I stayed during two days, and at last collected my caravan round me. Maungu was very nearly being a Moscow to my little army, but ultimately there was small loss in either men or goods. Some two or three porters had run back to the coast, leaving their burdens behind, while two miscreants who carried a case of spirit for preserving natural history specimens, had broached and drunk the alcohol, and, strange to say, still survived this extraordinary bout.