While Engaged On This Hunt I Felt The Earth Quiver Under My Feet,
And Heard A Soft Big Soughing Sound, And Looking Round Saw I Had
Dropped In On A Hippo Banquet.
I made out five of the immense
brutes round me, so I softly returned to the canoe and shoved off,
stealing along the bank, paddling under water, until I deemed it
safe to run out across the lake for my island.
I reached the other
end of it to that on which the village is situated; and finding a
miniature rocky bay with a soft patch of sand and no hippo grass,
the incidents of the Fan hut suggested the advisability of a bath.
Moreover, there was no china collection in that hut, and it would be
a long time before I got another chance, so I go ashore again, and,
carefully investigating the neighbourhood to make certain there was
no human habitation near, I then indulged in a wash in peace.
Drying one's self on one's cummerbund is not pure joy, but it can be
done when you put your mind to it. While I was finishing my toilet
I saw a strange thing happen. Down through the forest on the lake
bank opposite came a violet ball the size of a small orange. When
it reached the sand beach it hovered along it to and fro close to
the ground. In a few minutes another ball of similarly coloured
light came towards it from behind one of the islets, and the two
waver to and fro over the beach, sometimes circling round each
other.
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