Matters now looked more sunshiny. There were nearly 100 oxen in my kraal, and 60 or 70 sheep. My waggon-driver, who had stolen and who latterly had been insolent, I paid in articles of exchange and dismissed. Gabriel, at his own wish was left behind. A dozen Damaras agreed to go with us up the country, and Kahikenè, our friend, lay in our way. Hans and I rode short exploring excursions to find a road by which we could take the waggon out of the bed of the Swakop, and found one with great difficulty. Andersson then rode a wider sweep to see whether the country away from the Swakop looked open enough for a waggon. He went over a great deal of country, and returned with favourable news in five days, but he hardly saw a Damara, the land was so thinly peopled. We then made ready for our start, though the five mules had run quite away; they were traced through Barmen and Otjimbinguè to Tsobis, a distance of more than 100 miles, and there the chase was given up. I may as well anticipate my story and mention that they, or rather three of them, arrived at Scheppmansdorf; they had crossed the Naanip plain by instinct. The whole distance these runaways had travelled by themselves, viz., that from Schmelen’s Hope to Scheppmansdorf, is eighty-five hours’ travel very nearly, which at the rate of two and a half miles per hour gives 212 miles. A few incidents occurred at Schmelen’s Hope; first a plague of caterpillars that covered the ground, then a swarm, but not an utterly destructive one, of locusts, and, lastly, a flight of migratory storks, who made great war upon the locusts. We were perpetually teased by some hyenas—they came most impudently in amongst us as their peculiar spoors showed (the hind and fore feet being of unequal size), but we never could catch them; at last the dogs overtook one on a bright moonlight night and held him at bay. I was asleep and was quite undressed when their sharp barks awoke me, and I had only time to put on my shoes. The dogs and hyena were on the other side of the Swakop, which here is exceedingly broad, about 300 yards, and by the time we had floundered through the sand to the other side the animal had retreated among the rocks and hakis thorns into the deep shade, but the dogs held well to him. I sorely regretted the leather trowsers that were left behind, as my bare legs were scarified and bleeding. I could not see the hyena, except one glimpse when he brushed against my leg. At last the dogs surrounded him in a patch of moonshine, four or five feet from where I was, and I put a bullet through his back bone. The chase and the skurry made as exciting a piece of sport as I ever witnessed. We had some rifle shooting at geese and ducks, and Andersson slew a pan—the African bustard, and probably the best flavoured and most tender game that exists: John Morta cooked it with the utmost skill. I had returned from Jonker’s on the 8th of February, and for three weeks we remained at Schmelen’s Hope, waiting for