It had a calm and warm beginning, but, so far as I was concerned, an extremely uncomfortable finish.

During the day my clothes had become damp with perspiration.

Moreover, as our long marches and short sleeps had brought us round to the calendar day, we were facing the sun, and this, with the southwest wind, burned my face so badly that it was little short of agonizing.

But I consoled myself with the reflection that we were now less than a hundred miles from land.

I tried to forget my stinging flesh in looking at the land clouds which we could see from this camp.