Some brushwood was found on the banks, and with this they made a fire and cooked breakfast. Then they sat down to consider matters. After a long silence, Ned spoke. "Boys, we must see the top of this defile, and carry what water we require with us for the rest of the way. I reckon that we are more than halfway through it, and we have water-bags enough to last us a fortnight with care, and provisions for double that time." "Yes," answered Fred and Clarence, steadily. "I don't savy going back yet, with those precious bashikonay behind us," added Fred. "Then let us unpack our waterproof bags and fill them here. We can keep on for a few days, and if nothing promising turns up, we can easily come back." No one having any objection to offer, this order was obeyed. The water-bags were unpacked, filled, and the stoppers firmly screwed down. Then, after a refreshing wash and a big drink, they said good-bye to the crystal fount, and began their arid journey. As the pass became narrower, it also became more steep and winding. Sometimes the cliffs overhung so much that they lost sight altogether of the sky, and seemed to be walking through a vast fiery tunnel. It was hot and thirst-producing--this climbing over those parched rocks. The light never left them altogether by day, even within those closed-in portions. Sometimes they almost wished it had, to shut from their unwilling eyes some shuddering sights they at times beheld. They disturbed ugly-looking and venomous snakes, scorpions, and yellow-spotted great spiders, with other strange specimens of the reptile and insect world. It was, as Ned had remarked, a wonderful land, this Africa, with its strange curiosities of animal and insect life. They had seen already much more than they had anticipated seeing, in the forest and on the veldt. Yet this long and weary passage through the mountains seemed to give them every hour some new experience of the weird and horrible. As they struggled on, their hearts beat with expectancy of what was next to be revealed. The gorge was longer than they had expected; three days and nights had dragged along since they left the spring, and still they did not seem nearly at a termination. They were going in an undulating, yet on the whole pretty straight, course north-east, and they were ascending gradually. Already they had risen to an altitude of over six thousand feet above the plain, yet the cliffs, instead of diminishing in height, seemed to tower more loftily above their heads. It was an arduous climb, and felt prison-like and spirit-crushing in its narrow limits, yet, since it led them so straight, they could not but think it must soon end. They reckoned that these most lofty cliffs must be the centre peaks of the high inner mountains which they had seen from the distance.