Among the Brigands

by James De Mille

So great was the confidence which they all felt in their preparations, precautions, and barricades, that not the slightest thought of danger remained in the mind of any one of them to create alarm, with the single exception of Bob.

For some reason or other Bob was more excitable at this time than the others. It may have been that this was his nature, or it may have been that his nerves were more sensitive since his tremendous adventures during the night of horror near Paestum; but whatever was the cause, certain it is, that on this occasion he remained wide awake, and incapable of sleep, while all the others were slumbering the sleep of the innocent.

He and Frank had the same bed, and it was the bed which had been placed against the door. It had been placed in such a way that the head of the bed was against the door. On the north side of the room, and on the left of this bed, was another, in which Uncle Moses slept; while on the south side, or the right, was the bed which was occupied by David and Clive. In this way they had disposed of themselves.

Bob was very wakeful. The beds were father unprepossessing, and consequently they had all retired without altogether undressing themselves; but in spite of this comparative discomfort they soon fell asleep. Bob alone remained awake.

He tried all he could to overcome his wakefulness. He resorted to all the means for producing sleep that he had ever heard of or read of. He tried counting, and went on counting and counting tens, and hundreds, and thousands. He counted fast, and he counted slow. In vain. Counting was useless, and when he had reached as high as four thousand seven hundred and thirty-seven, he gave it up in disgust.

Then he tried another infallible recipe for sleep He imagined, or tried to imagine, endless lines of rolling waves. This also was useless.

Then he tried another. He endeavored to imagine clouds of smoke rolling before him. This was as useless as the others.

Then he tested ever so many other methods, as follows:—

Waving grain.
Marching soldiers.
Funerals.
A shore covered with sea-weed.
An illimitable forest.
A ditto prairie.
The vault of heaven.
The wide, shoreless ocean.
A cataract.
Fireworks.
The stars.
A burning forest.
Looking at his nose.
Wishing himself asleep.
Rubbing his forehead.
Lying on his back,
do. do. right side.
do. do. left side.
do. do. face.

And about seventy-nine other methods, which need not be mentioned, for the simple reason that they were all equally useless.