CONQUEST OF SOKOTO AND KANO 447 the horses could hardly tread upon them, and the dry wind blew like the breath of a furnace, parching the throats of the men. The water of the country during the greater part of the march was impregnated with salts of soda and potash, and increased, instead of allaying thirst. At night the temperature suddenly fell, and the cold became so sharp that the native troops suffered severely from pneumonia and lung diseases. At a place called Shagali the force turned southwards to effect a junction with some British troops which had been employed on escort duty for French convoys, and for the Boundary Commission near Argungu. Here a letter was received from the Emir of Gando, to whom also conciliatory messages had been sent, making his submission. Sokoto alone remained obdurate, and the column, somewhat depleted by the hardships of the march, but reinforced by the troops from Argungu, marched upon the town. On the 15th of March a battle took place, in which the Sokoto troops were defeated and put to flight.

In the meantime the High Commissioner, anxious as before to be on the spot for the purpose of arranging political conditions as soon as the military blow should have been delivered, left Kano on March 7, accompanied by Captain Abadie as Political Officer, and an escort of seventy Yorubas under a white subaltern, with the intention of making his way by forced marches in the rear of the troops towards Sokoto. The British force had about twelve days' start of him ; but, in consequence of a misunderstanding when it turned southward on its approach to Sokoto, the road was left undefended. The High Commissioner's party had therefore the interesting experience of marching six Europeans strong, without any mounted men to act as scouts, through an enemy's country full of populous walled towns, owning allegiance to the sovereign upon whose capital the body of the British force was advancing. The distance from Kano to Sokoto was about 250 miles. The road for the greater part of the way