Niger

Beasts howled about him in the moonlight, but
made no attack. Half a mile from the town he
heard someone hail him in the moon-sheen, and
looked back and saw the faithful Demba trotting in
his tracks. The slave could not allow Mungo to
face the wastes alone. They conferred for a little,
Mungo perhaps with a slight twinge of emotion,
and Demba offered to go back to the town and try
and prevail on the slave of Jarra to go with them
as well.
Mungo waited in the moonlight, hearing the
cough of a hunting lion. Then Demba came back
through the shadows in company with the Jarra
slave, and they travelled on through the morning,
across the sandy wastes, and on still until noon,
putting as much space as possible between them¬
selves and Deena. Near noon they came to a
deserted village and Mungo sent the Jarra slave to
fill a calabash with water at the pond that shone
at a little distance. But as he neared the pond the
slave heard the even nearer snuffle of a lion, and
ran back to Mungo.
Thirstily they pushed on, and in the late after¬
noon reached a village of the Foulahs where they
were spared insult and permitted to sleep.
Next day was the 4th of March. Mungo had
swung southwards by now. The waste scrubland
had given way again to woods and cultivated
patches. After noon Mungo saw his first cloud of
locusts in migration. Presently the trees grew
black with them, and 4 the noise of their excrement
120