It was of no use halting again.

To halt was certain death--and they struggled on with fast-waning strength, scarcely able to retain their seats or speak to one another.

Thirst had almost deprived them of the power of speech! It was near sunset, when the travellers, faint, choking, panting for breath, bent down in their saddles, their horses dragging along under them like loaded bees, approached the foot of the eminence.

Their eyes were thrown forward in eager glances--glances in which hope and despair were strangely blended.
The grey, rocky bluff, that fronted them, looked parched and forbidding.
It seemed to frown inhospitably upon them as they drew near.
"O brothers! should there be no water!" This exclamation was hardly uttered, when the mule Jeanette, hitherto lagging behind, sprang forward in a gallop, hinnying loudly as she ran.
Jeanette, as we have said, was an old prairie traveller, and could scent water as far as a wolf could have done her own carcass.

The other animals, seeing her act in this manner, rushed after; and the next moment the little cavalcade passed round a point of rocks, where a green sward gladdened the eyes of all.