PURSUIT After all we did not get away much before noon, because first there was a great deal to be done.

To begin with the loads had to be arranged.
These consisted largely of ammunition, everything else being cut down to an irreducible minimum.

To carry them we took two donkeys there were on the place, also half a dozen pack oxen, all of which animals were supposed to be "salted"-- that is, to have suffered and recovered from every kind of sickness, including the bite of the deadly tsetse fly.
I suspected, it is true, that they would not be proof against further attacks, still, I hoped that they would last for some time, as indeed proved to be the case.
In the event of the beasts failing us, we took also ten of the best of those Strathmuir men who had accompanied us on the sea-cow trip, to serve as bearers when it became necessary.

It cannot be said that these snuff-and-butter fellows--for most, if not all of them had some dash of white blood in their veins--were exactly willing volunteers.

Indeed, if a choice had been left to them, they would, I think, have declined this adventure.
But there was no choice.