The following morning at the first glimmer of dawn we scouts left the bivouac, and pushed on up the river-bed, but before we had progressed a couple of miles we came to a place where the river rushed through a deep, rocky gorge that prevented us making any further use of its bed as a thoroughfare. I therefore awaited the arrival of the Colonel, who shortly joined me, and after a short discussion he determined the column should cross the stream and make its way up a steep, razor-backed ridge that sloped down to the water. We had considerable difficulty in crossing, as not only the current ran very fast, but the bed was composed of slippery boulders over which many of our men stumbled and fell. At last they were all over, but long before the last man crossed we scouts had out tomahawk and were painfully chopping a path through the tangled fern, ground-vines and lawyers--the latter being scrub, bearing thorns shaped like fish hooks, and are as dangerous to come in contact with as their human namesakes--with which the steep slope was densely covered. On reaching the summit we found ourselves on a long serrated ridge running within a point or two of the direction we wanted to go, both sides of it being heavily bushed, but the ridge itself, thanks to its narrowness and the rocky nature of the soil, only carried stunted fern, through which we could march with comparative ease. We therefore thanked our stars for this slice of luck, and, after we had excavated the larger thorns, licked such scratches as we could get at to lick, and swallowing a handful of soaked mouldy biscuit, we scouts started, while the column was still painfully crawling up the slope. Towards midday we came to where the ridge suddenly ended in a very nearly perpendicular drop into a deep valley, on the other side of which, situated on a plateau of the same altitude as that on which we stood, we saw a large kainga. The cover on our side was very good, so I halted, sending back Tim and George a few hundred yards to await and report to the Colonel, while Pierre and I scouted to either flank, prospecting for the best place to descend. This I found, but when found it had not much in its favour to recommend it, as it simply bristled with huge boulders and trees, the ground in between which was, as per usual, a dense tangle of ground-vines, lawyers and tough fern. Still it was practicable, and the Colonel on viewing it decided to make use of it to descend into the deep valley. I also pointed out to him that across the valley ran up two steep spurs leading to the plateau upon which the kainga stood, and which perhaps, _faute de mieux_, could be used for attacking purposes. _Facilis decensus Averni_ may be true, but we found it by no means easy, much less pleasant, to descend that infernal hill, and it was only by lowering our loads, and even one another, down the worst places that at last, tattered and torn, we reached the foot, but fortunately, although many men were badly