"Mine's no use. It only boasts one hand—the big one."
"Anyway," observed the farming instructor, pointing with a fingernail, which was in deep mourning, to a place on the map, "here's where we are now—fifteen miles north-west of camp. And the sun sets in the west, don't it?" He looked at Sam, who nodded with mock attention. "And rises in the east?"—Sam again nodded. "So at noon, it's due south, ain't it?" Sam ran his eyes up and down the guide's massive figure.
"Wot's due south?"
Slightly exhausted by the effort of making so extremely abstruse a deduction, the guide replied weariedly: "The sun."
"I thought it was the camp you was findin'," said Sam innocently.
"My God!" muttered the government astronomer; "don't you see what I'm a-tryin' to get at?"
"Tryin' ter get us 'ome, aren't yer?"
"Yes."
"Well, do it then; an' don't 'ammergag abaht so damn much."
The guide was shocked. He glanced furtively at the ladies, then back at Sam, and seemed so upset about something that he permitted a trickle of dark-coloured saliva to escape from the corner of his mouth and mingle with his stubbly black whiskers.