which carried off a hundred horses of the 3d Native Cavalry. It is very
sudden in its action, and is in nearly every case fatal. The animals seem
seized with some internal pain, arch their backs, and become rigid. In a
short time the tongue grows black, a discharge takes place from the
nostrils, and in a few hours, sometimes not more than one, from the time
he is attacked, the animal is dead. At present, as with our
cattle-disease, all remedies are ineffectual. Animals in good condition
are more liable to be attacked than are the poorer ones. After dinner we
returned to our tent, where, however, we did not pass a
remarkably-pleasant night. In the first place, it was bitterly cold—the
temperature of Rayray Guddy is indeed colder than it is here; and in the
second, a mule had broken loose from its head-ropes, and came down to our
encampment. Five or six times it nearly upset our tent by tumbling over
the tent-ropes, in addition to which it made our horses so savage by going
up among them, that we were afraid of their breaking loose. Four or five
times, therefore, did we have to get up and go out in the cold to drive
the beast away with stones. The grooms were sleeping at their horses’
heads, but were so wrapped up in their rugs that they heard nothing of it.
The next morning it was so cold that we were really glad to be up and
moving, and were on our way at a little before eight. The first six miles
of the road is narrow and winding, and is as lovely a road as I ever
passed. With the exception only of the narrow pathway, the gorge was one
mass of foliage. In addition to all the plants I have mentioned as
occurring below, we had now the wild fig, the laburnum, various sorts of
acacia, and many others, One plant in particular, I believe a species of
acacia, was in seed; the seed-pods were a reddish-brown, but were very
thin and transparent, and when the sun shone upon them were of the colour
of the clearest carmine. As these shrubs were in great abundance, and
completely covered with seed-pods, their appearance was very brilliant.
Among all these plants fluttered numerous humming-birds of the most lovely
colours. Other birds of larger size and gorgeous plumage perched among the
trees at a short distance from the path. Brilliant butterflies flitted
here and there among the flowers.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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