290 TRAVELS IN AFRICA.

to drink but very sparingly, and travelling barefoot on a hard and broken soil, covered with long dried reeds and thorny underwood, may be more easily conceived than described. One young woman who had (for the first time) become a mother two days only before she was taken, and whose child, being thought by her captor too young to be worth saving, was thrown by the monster into its burning hut, from which the flames had just obliged the motlier to retreat, suffered so much from the swollen state of her bosom, that her moans might frequently be heard at the distance of some hundred yards, when refusing to go on she implored her iiend-like captor to put an end to her existence ; but that would have been too great a sacrifice to humanity, and a few blows with a leathern horse fetter, soon made the wretched creature move again. A man also lay down, and neither blows, entreaties, nor threats of death could induce him to move. He was thrown across a horse, his face down, and with his hands and feet tied together under the animal's chest, was carried along for some distance. This position, however, soon caused difficulty of breathing, and almost suffocation, which would certainly soon have ended his miserable existence had they not placed him in a more easy posture, by allowing him to ride