Accordingly, an hour or two after the expedition had started from camp, I packed up a light kit and started for the sea-shore. The road, as far as the top of the first descent, is now so free from stone that it might be used as a race-course, but we found that nothing had yet been done with the zigzag down the face of the hill. However, as we met no mules upon our way it was an easy descent enough; indeed the whole pass, from end to end, although it has its difficulties, still presents no real obstacle to a single traveller. It is only when viewed in the light of a highway for an army, as the only line of communication up which the stores of 20,000 men must come, that one considers it to be a really terrible business. No forage is procurable for the baggage-animals between the sea and Senafe, seventy miles. A large proportion, therefore, of the mules is occupied in carrying food for themselves and their companions. The stages, too, for heavily-burdened animals across an exceedingly-rough road are distressingly long. Twelve miles a-day, with a pause for an hour to feed and water in the middle of the day, could be done by heavily-loaded mules without deterioration of their quality. But here all the stages, except the last, considerably exceed that distance; and from Sooro to Rayray Guddy, over thirty miles, is practically without food or water. This is what makes the Koomaylo Pass so difficult as the highway of an army—want of forage the whole distance, and long intervals between the watering-places; to which may be added the disease which infects the pass and decimates the animals as they go up and down. The mule, although one of the most enduring of creatures, and capable of sustaining great privations, is yet a delicate animal. Feed him well, keep him supplied with water and hay, and he will do wonders; but without regular and abundant food he falls away rapidly. During the last campaign in Italy there were thousands of mules engaged transporting provisions up the Tyrol to Garibaldi. They had great fatigue and long marches, but they were well fed and had plenty of water; and consequently throughout the campaign I never saw a dead mule, and hardly one out of condition. Here it is just the reverse; the mules are greatly fallen off, and although they are now much better fed, they will be a very long time before they regain their lost strength. In respect to food a great improvement has been effected in the last few days. Captain Sewell has been here about a week. He is in charge of the commissariat, and has purchased considerable quantities of hay, which is now served out to the mules here, and to their even worse-off brethren down at Rayray Guddy; for here, at least, in their intervals of labour the mules were able to graze, while in the valley there is not a blade of grass to be had. Captain Mortimer, indeed, who is in charge of the transport division there, only kept his animals alive by