It was hard, polished, and full of pockets worn by centuries of eddying rain-water.

A hundred yards up began a line of grotesque cedar-trees, and they extended along the slope clear to its most southerly end.

Beyond that end Venters wanted to get, and he concluded the cedars, few as they were, would afford some cover.
Therefore he climbed swiftly.

The trees were farther up than he had estimated, though he had from long habit made allowance for the deceiving nature of distances in that country.

When he gained the cover of cedars he paused to rest and look, and it was then he saw how the trees sprang from holes in the bare rock.