When He Had Got Out, He Handed Back Silence's Load
And Got A Dash Of Tobacco For His Help; He
Left us to devote the
rest of his evening by his forest fire to unthorning himself, while
we proceeded to
Wade a swift, deepish river that crossed the path he
told us led into Egaja, and then went across another bit of forest
and downhill again. "Oh, bless those swamps!" thought I, "here's
another," but no - not this time. Across the bottom of the steep
ravine, from one side to another, lay an enormous tree as a bridge,
about fifteen feet above a river, which rushed beneath it, over a
boulder-encumbered bed. I took in the situation at a glance, and
then and there I would have changed that bridge for any swamp I have
ever seen, yea, even for a certain bush-rope bridge in which I once
wound myself up like a buzzing fly in a spider's web. I was
fearfully tired, and my legs shivered under me after the falls and
emotions of the previous part of the day, and my boots were slippery
with water soaking.
The Fans went into the river, and half swam, half waded across. All
the Ajumba, save Pagan, followed, and Ngouta got across with their
assistance. Pagan thought he would try the bridge, and I thought I
would watch how the thing worked. He got about three yards along it
and then slipped, but caught the tree with his hands as he fell, and
hauled himself back to my side again; then he went down the bank and
through the water. This was not calculated to improve one's nerve;
I knew by now I had got to go by the bridge, for I saw I was not
strong enough in my tired state to fight the water. If only the
wretched thing had had its bark on it would have been better, but it
was bare, bald, and round, and a slip meant death on the rocks
below. I rushed it, and reached the other side in safety, whereby
poor Pagan got chaffed about his failure by the others, who said
they had gone through the water just to wash their feet.
The other side, when we got there, did not seem much worth reaching,
being a swampy fringe at the bottom of a steep hillside, and after a
few yards the path turned into a stream or backwater of the river.
It was hedged with thickly pleached bushes, and covered with liquid
water on the top of semi-liquid mud. Now and again for a change you
had a foot of water on top of fearfully slippery harder mud, and
then we light-heartedly took headers into the bush, sideways, or sat
down; and when it was not proceeding on the evil tenor of its way,
like this, it had holes in it; in fact, I fancy the bottom of the
holes was the true level, for it came near being as full of holes as
a fishing-net, and it was very quaint to see the man in front, who
had been paddling along knee-deep before, now plop down with the
water round his shoulders; and getting out of these slippery
pockets, which were sometimes a tight fit, was difficult.
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