Also we had some food, and fortunately our spare oil held out, for the darkness in that tunnel was complete.

Tommy became so exhausted that at length we must carry him by turns.

He would have died had it not been for the water; indeed I thought that he was going to die.
After our last rest and a short sleep, however, he seemed to begin to recover, and generally there was something in his manner which suggested to us that he knew himself to be not far from the surface of the earth towards which we had crawled upwards for thousands upon thousands of feet, fortunately without meeting with any zone of heat which was not bearable.
We were right, for when we had staggered forward a little further, suddenly Tommy ran ahead of us and vanished.

Then we heard him barking but where we could not see, since the tunnel appeared to take a turn and continue, but this time on a downward course, while the sound of the barks came from our right.

We searched with the lanterns which were now beginning to die and found a little hole almost filled with fallen pieces of rock.