Despairingly I fired again, almost without taking aim, and this time the
bullet went in beneath the throat, and, raking the animal, dropped it
dead as a stone. We scrambled to it, and presently were engaged in an
awful meal of which we never afterwards liked to think. Happily for us
that antelope must have drunk water not long before.

Our hunger and thirst assuaged after this horrible fashion, we slept
awhile by the carcase, then arose extraordinarily refreshed, and, having
cut off some hunks of meat to carry with us, started on again. By the
position of the stars, we now knew that the oasis must lie somewhere to
the east of us; but as between us and it there appeared to be nothing
but these eternal sand-hills stretching away for many miles, and as in
front of us toward the range the character of the desert seemed to be
changing, we thought it safer, if the word safety can be used in such
a connection, to continue to head for that range. All the remainder of
this night we marched, and, as we had no fuel wherewith to cook it, at
dawn ate some of the raw meat, which we washed down with the last drops
of our water.

Now we were out of the sand-hills, and had entered on a great pebbly
plain that lay between us and the foot of the mountains. These looked
quiet close, but in fact were still far off. Feebly and ever more feebly
we staggered on, meeting no one and finding no water, though here and
there we came across little bushes, of which we chewed the stringy and
aromatic leaves that contained some moisture, but drew up our mouths and
throats like alum.

Higgs, who was the softest of us, gave out the first, though to the
last he struggled forward with surprising pluck, even after he had been
obliged to throw away his rifle, because he could no longer carry it,