[Illustration: CAMP IN OVAMPO-LAND. John Murray, Albemarle Street, 1853] Ondonga is a very difficult place to get away from. Indeed if anything had occurred to make it advisable for me to force a quick retreat I hardly know how I should have done it. It would have been very questionable if we could have found our way back by Netjo’s house; for, as I mentioned before, the country is remarkably uniform, intersected with paths, and quite destitute of natural features to guide us. It is also slightly undulating, enough so to limit the view to a mile or two ahead. There was vley water, if we did not miss it, near to Netjo’s; and thence there remained a journey of twenty-one hours, two hours in Ondonga, and nineteen in the thorns and flats, without water; and as part of this lay over a bleak country the stage was too severe a one for any weak ox to endure. I found that some Ovampos had been tampering with my Damara cattle-watchers; one, a man whom I had taken from Chapupa’s werft, became impudent, and instead of driving my cattle to grass, kept them on a bare place for half the day; so I took active measures upon his back and shoulders, to an extent that astonished the Ovampo and reformed the man. _June 6th._—Nangoro did not come, but sent us a little corn as a present, and requested us to fire off our guns, as he wished to hear what kind of noise they made. We had plenty of ammunition, and therefore amused ourselves with some rifle practice, which several Ovampo watched from a short distance with great interest.