Leaving our secure hiding-place at 10 p.m. as usual, we made good progress until we came to a stream which had evidently been widened artificially, as it had the appearance of a canal at the point at which we struck it. It was quicker we thought to strip and cross at once than to hunt up and down, perhaps without avail, for a possible bridge.
I took to the water first. It was up to my shoulders and the bottom was muddy. I went across to try it without any of our possessions with me. It was lucky I did so, as at the other side of the stream I got into very bad mud and had a hard job to get out of it. By dint of half swimming, half clambering among the thick reeds on the edge of the river I managed to get over, but I had found out the best way to tackle it, and went back to the other side quite easily.
Taking the bulk of our possessions tied roughly together on the big bag with me, I got safely across and deposited them on the other side by my second trip.
Another journey, and all our gear was across. Fox being a heavy man could naturally do none of this work as the mud was too treacherous. As it was, in attempting to cross himself, he got badly stuck near the bed of reeds on the other side.
With my hand to help him and by making use of the reeds with arms and body, he struggled clear at last, by no means sorry to be on firm ground again.
Quickly dressing ourselves we got away in very little time, and made rapid progress.
Our map was very faulty in its description of this part of the country. Villages had sprung up lately perhaps, and as it was an old map they were not included in it.
The main result of this to us was that we discovered here at unexpected moments villages and collections of farms in front of us. We took them all as they came, driven to great speed by the threat of having to reduce our food rations. As usual our canine foes advertised our movements everywhere, but we had become thoroughly used to them by now, and took little or no notice of them.
The sign-posts at the road-junctions in this particularly old-world district were very ancient, often written in old German characters. To read them it was frequently necessary for me to mount on Fox's shoulders in order to get a closer look at blurred and faded words.
These villages, seen as they were by the light of a nearly full-moon, gave one the impression of being extremely beautiful. The houses were all old. Bulging walls, practically all containing supports and cross-pieces of old timber, and low eaves were common.