About four in the afternoon
It would have been better if we had made a third trip to the cisterns and refilled our coffee-pot and camp-kettles ; but the delay necessary to do it , and the assurance that there was water at Hole-in-the-Plain , determined me to go on at once . The weather was a repetition of that of the previous day -- hot and windless . The road proved generally smooth , but there were occasional long stretches over which it was impossible to drive faster than a walk . About four in the afternoon we reached Hole-in-the-Plain , and found nothing but a few hundred square yards of thin mud . The fierce rays of the sun had nearly evaporated every vestige of the recent rainfall , and in twenty-four hours more the mud would be baked earth . Vic , consumed with thirst and suffering in the extreme heat , waded into the mud and rolled in it until she was the color of a fresh adobe , and was , in consequence , made to ride thereafter in disgrace on the driver 's foot-board . We had intended to pass the night at the Hole , but want of water compelled us to move on .