Spies afterwards said that when Osman heard of this incident, and of the number of men killed, he said, “it served them right. They had no business to go touching things that did not belong to them!”
Chapter Fifteen.
Athletics—A New Acquaintance turns up—An Expedition undertaken, followed by a Race for Life.
Energetic and exhilarating exercise has sometimes the effect of driving away sickness which doctors’ stuff and treatment fail to cope with successfully. In saying this we intend no slight either to doctors’ stuff or treatment!
After the troops had been some time at Suakim the effect of the climate began to tell on them so severely that a very large proportion of Europeans were in hospital, and many who strove hard to brave it out were scarcely fit for duty.
Great heat did not, however, interfere with Miles Milton’s health. He was one of those fortunates who seem to have been made of tougher clay than the average of humanity. But his friend Armstrong was laid up for a considerable time. Even Robert Macleod was knocked over for a brief period, and the lively Corporal Flynn succumbed at last. Moses Pyne, however, stood the test of hard work and bad climate well, and so, for a time, did Sergeant Hardy. It was found generally that the abstainers from strong drink suffered less from bad health and unwholesome surroundings than their fellows, and as there were a good many in the regiment, who were constantly endeavouring to convince their comrades of the advantages of total-abstinence, things were not so bad as they might have been.
It was about this time that one of the generals who visited Suakim instituted athletic games, thereby vastly improving the health and spirits of the men. And now Miles Milton learned, for the first time, what an immense power there lies in “scientific training!”
One evening, when out walking with Stevenson, he took it into his head to race with him, and, having been a crack runner at school, he beat him easily.