Page:The land of fetish.pdf/32

 supplement the somewhat scanty food supply of the colony with green pigeons, wild ducks, curlew, and snipe from this place; but now the report of a gun but rarely awakes its echoes.

On the other side of the creek I entered upon a swampy region, consisting of stretches of sand and small lagoons surrounded by dwarf mangroves; and after splashing through the last of these I found myself in front of a dense growth of grass, eight or nine feet high. I thought that if all the open country of which I had heard were like this I should not care much about it, and rode into the narrow path which lay before me. The grass closed overhead, and I could see nothing in front but a long green tunnel, with occasional flecks of gold on the sand where the sunlight broke through. The grass was heavy with dew; a continual shower-bath of drops fell on me from above, and the long wet stems brushed my legs on either side. I should have enjoyed it very much if I had been unprovided with clothes, but I had not anticipated this bath, and was consequently dressed.

After a couple of miles of this I emerged into an open plain, as thoroughly wet through as if I had been towed behind a boat for a quarter of an hour; but the view compensated for any little discomfort. The country was of a dead level, covered with waving