TANTALISING. 241 start from Gakdul next evening (the 3rd of March) at five, so that meant we should pack up and go three or four hours after him.

Our camels were very limited in numbers and strength, one to every two officers, or every six men, and hardly any extra camels allowed for mess or otherwise. A supply of jams and pickles had at last arrived from Korti only two days before, and these we welcomed with rapacious joy ; but if we weren't allowed any camels to carry these hardly-won condiments back, what was to become of them ? Obviously only one thing get through them as soon as possible, and bring back as much as we could carry privately.

Accordingly, a quantity of these good things were distributed to the men, and after stowing away as much as we could in our kits, we stowed away the remainder in our stomachs. It was, in fact, a question of eating against time, hardly a useful preparation for a tramp of nearly a hundred miles. I heard some time afterwards that the Heavies had likewise been in much the same fix, having had several magnums of champagne sent them the very night