about
ten o’clock in the morning
`` Because , Baas , if he were , he would not have left Hans , of whom he always thought so well , to run in the sun like a dog , while he and others travel in carriages like great white ladies . '' `` You had better save your breath instead of talking nonsense , Hans , '' I said , `` since I believe that you have a long way to go . '' In fact , it proved to be a very long way indeed , especially as after we began to breast the mountain , we must travel slowly . We started about ten o'clock in the morning , for the fight which after all did not take long -- had , it will be remembered , begun shortly after dawn , and it was three in the afternoon before we reached the base of the towering cliff which I have mentioned . Here , at the foot of a remarkable , isolated column of rock , on which I was destined to see a strange sight in the after days , we halted and ate of the remaining food which we had brought with us , while the Amahagger consumed their own , that seemed to consist largely of curdled milk , such as the Zulus call _ maas _ , and lumps of a kind of bread . I noted that they were a very curious people who fed in silence and on whose handsome , solemn faces one never saw a smile . Somehow it gave me the creeps to look at them .