but no rain; thermometer 106 degrees.  On returning to camp, we were told that the water was rapidly failing, it becoming fine by degrees and beautifully less.  At night the heavens were illuminated for hours by the most wonderful lightnings; it was, I suppose, too distant to permit the sound of thunder to be heard.  On the 8th we made sure that rain would fall, the night and morning were very hot.  We had clouds, thunder, lightning, thermometer 112 degrees and every mortal disagreeable thing we wanted; so how could we expect rain? but here, thanks to Moses, or Pharaoh, or Providence, or the rocks, we were not troubled with ants.  The next day we cleared out; the water was gone, so we went also.  The thermometer was 110 degrees in the shade when we finally left these miserable hills.  We steered away again for Fort Mueller, via the Lightning Rock, which was forty-five miles away.  We traversed a country nearly all scrub, passing some hills and searching channels and gullies as we went.  We only got over twenty-one miles by night; I had been very unwell for the last three or four days, and to-day I was almost too ill to sit on my horse; I had fever, pains all over, and a splitting headache.  The country being all scrub, I was compelled as usual to ride with a bell on my stirrup.  Jingle jangle all day long; what with heat, fever, and the pain I was in, and the din of that infernal bell, I really thought it no sin to wish myself out of this world, and into a better, cooler, and less noisy one, where not even:—­

   “To heavenly harps the angelic choir,
    Circling the throne of the eternal King;”

should:—­

   “With hallowed lips and holy fire,
    Rejoice their hymns of praise to sing;”

which revived in my mind vague opinions with regard to our notions of heaven.  If only to sit for ever singing hymns before Jehovah’s throne is to be the future occupation of our souls, it is doubtful if the thought should be so pleasing, as the opinions of Plato and other philosophers, and which Addison has rendered to us thus:—­

   “Eternity, thou pleasing, dreadful thought,
    Through what variety of untried being,
    Through what new scenes and changes must we pass
    The wide, the unbounded prospect lies before me,” etc.

But I am trenching upon debatable ground, and have no desire to enter an argument upon the subject.  It is doubtless better to believe the tenets taught us in our childhood, than to seek at mature age to unravel a mystery which it is self-evident the Great Creator never intended that man in this state of existence should become acquainted with.  However, I’ll say no more on such a subject, it is quite foreign to the matter of my travels, and does not ease my fever in any way—­in fact it rather augments it.