Cecily was much better, though still travelling luxuriously, but there was not much more than a gallon of water left. We opened a bottle of lukewarm champagne and drank a little at intervals, but this silly idea made us nearly frantic with thirst, and we wished we hadn’t thought of it. The ponies, poor creatures, had been without water for hours, and their lolling tongues and straining eyes went to our hearts. Cecily was the more concerned, because she said but for her the water would have lasted. I assured her it was my prodigality, but in any case it was water well wasted, as she was almost herself again.
I consulted with Clarence, and we found that by going on, never stopping, for another twenty miles we should make wells. Twenty miles was a big thing to us then with horses and men in the state ours were. I asked them, through Clarence, to “make an effort,” and promised them water by the morning. We struck camp on a grilling afternoon at 4.30. Cecily in her hammock, I alternately walking to ease my pony, and then mounting for a little to ease myself. I will not describe the tramp through the night, or how very childish the men got. I prefer the English way of bearing small troubles—in silence. I think it is embarrassing to be let in on the ground floor of anyone’s emotion.
Let it pass!
A few camel men raced on ahead, and got to the wells before the main caravan, who were able to quicken the pace pathetically little, and we made safety, which this time spelt water, about an hour after dawn. I saw the ponies watered myself before turning in, and I slept eight hours straight on end.
Going out late in the evening with the object of securing something for the pot, I came on a regular aviary of birds. Sand grouse and pigeons, guinea-fowl and wild geese, and small birds too in thousands. I lay down for a little and watched the small ones preparing for the night. I love the tiny birds of Somaliland, and never wearied of studying their pretty ways. It seems to me that they are most beautiful in proportion to their size of any bird life. The protections, the pleadings, the dances, the love-making, the little furies, the make-believes, cannot be excelled in charm.
I was too wearied out to bother much, even though food in plenty was there to my hand, and I don’t like killing anything so tame, even when I ought to. When I got back to camp I sent Clarence out with instructions to shoot some guinea-fowl and geese.
A vast caravan of some hundreds arrived at the wells in the middle of that night, and things hummed for an hour or so. I was not disturbed, except by the wrangling that went on all the hours until dawn. It was very cold, and my “carpet” ended on the top of me!