“I accordingly pushed further and further into the forest, in expectation of meeting a musk at any turn, and until it became evident that my hopes were not to be realised, when finally, getting tired of tracking, I gave up the pursuit, and set off in quest of rare birds.
“Here and there the harsh screams of the speckled nutcracker and yellow grosbeak drew me away in opposite directions, until, after devious swervings to the right and left, it suddenly dawned on me that my pocket compass had been forgotten. What was to be done? In what direction lay the river? It was useless attempting to retrace my footsteps, for, what between the hard nature of the ground, and my soft grass shoes, anything like an impression was impossible.
“I pulled out my watch to find it was four o’clock, thus leaving three hours of daylight. So now in which direction should I proceed? These and many anxious thoughts flashed across my mind, when, shouldering the gun, I stared about for a way more likely than another in the dismal gloom; but not one opening or indication seemed preferable to the rest.
“How often I had changed front since starting could not be surmised; however, a conviction arose in my mind that the way back to camp did not lie in front of the position in which I stood at that moment, accordingly I wheeled about, and set off at full speed in an exactly opposite direction.
“At first a straight ahead course seemed the proper one, but after a time it was apparent that I had been unconsciously bearing off too much to the left, and, as there was a gentle slope in that direction, a feeling kept constantly increasing that this was the watershed of the Chenaub, for the sound of whose troubled waters I stopped constantly to listen, but in vain.
“Uneasiness now grew apace, with the cravings of hunger, whilst the sun declined, and finally the glare on the tree tops vanished, leaving an obscurity which was soon doomed to blacken into night.”
No. 75.
LINKED IN FIERCE STRUGGLE, PEACE AND THE FOOTMAN FALL FROM THE WINDOW.
“What a position to be in!” cried Smythe. “Indian forests, as a rule, are not the safest places in the world for a man to put up at, or bivouac in for the night. Beasts of prey, to say nothing of snakes or serpents, are to be found there in abundance.”