about midnight
Accordingly , as soon as the sun got low , having little or nothing more to hope for from our friendly wind , we started . For the first hour or so we managed to row the boat , though with great labour ; but after that the weeds got too thick to allow of it , and we were obliged to resort to the primitive and most exhausting resource of towing her . For two hours we laboured , Mahomed , Job , and I , who was supposed to be strong enough to pull against the two of them , on the bank , while Leo sat in the bow of the boat , and brushed away the weeds which collected round the cutwater with Mahomed 's sword . At dark we halted for some hours to rest and enjoy the mosquitoes , but about midnight we went on again , taking advantage of the comparative cool of the night . At dawn we rested for three hours , and then started once more , and laboured on till about ten o'clock , when a thunderstorm , accompanied by a deluge of rain , overtook us , and we spent the next six hours practically under water . I do not know that there is any necessity for me to describe the next four days of our voyage in detail , further than to say that they were , on the whole , the most miserable that I ever spent in my life , forming one monotonous record of heavy labour , heat , misery , and mosquitoes . All that dreary way we passed through a region of almost endless swamp , and I can only attribute our escape from fever and death to the constant doses of quinine and purgatives which we took , and the unceasing toil which we were forced to undergo .