[[1]: Every watercourse with any water at all, even in occasional pools, is m'to--a river--in Africa.]
"And I to go in the other direction?" asked Cazi Moto.
Bwana Kingozi considered, glancing at the setting sun, and again up the dry stream-bed where, as far as the eye could reach, were no more indications of water.
"No," he decided. "It is late. Soon the lions will be hunting. I will go."
The men sprawled in abandon. After an interval a shrill whistle sounded from the direction in which Bwana Kingozi had disappeared. The men stretched and began to rise to their feet slowly. The short rest had stiffened them and brought home the weariness to their bones. They grumbled and muttered, and only the omnipresence of Cazi Moto and the threat of his restless whip roused them to activity. Down the stream they limped sullenly.
Kingozi stood waiting near the edge of the bank. The thicket here was very dense.
"Water there," he briefly indicated. "The big tent here; the opening in that direction. Cook fire over there. Loads here."
The men who had been standing, the burdens still on their heads, moved forward. The tent porter--who, by the way, was the strongest and most reliable of the men, so that always, even on a straggling march, the tent would arrive first--threw it down at the place selected and at once began to undo the cords. The bearers of the kitchen, who were also reliable travellers, set about the cook camp.
A big Monumwezi unstrapped a canvas chair, unfolded it, and placed it near his master. The other loads were arranged here, in a certain long-ordained order; the meat piled there. Several men then went to the assistance of Mali-ya-bwana, the tent bearer; and the others methodically took up various tasks. Some began with their pangas to hew a way to the water through the dense thicket that had kept it sweet; others sought firewood; still others began to pitch the tiny drill tents--each to accommodate six men--in a wide circle of which the pile of loads was the centre. As the men fell into the ordered and habitual routine their sullenness and weariness vanished.
Kingozi dropped into the canvas chair, fumbled for a pipe, filled and lighted it. With a sigh of relief he laid aside his cork helmet. The day had not only been a hard one, but an anxious one, for this country was new to every member of the little expedition, native guides had been impossible to procure, and the chances of water had been those of an arid region.