Page:Volunteering in India.djvu/25

Rh visible in its midst are some picturesque mosques, and a huge bell-shaped building, with a winding outer staircase leading to the top.

We crossed the Ganges at Patna. The river was at its lowest level; still the passage, beginning with dawn glimmering upon our difficulties, continued the whole of the day, and did not terminate before the shadows of eventide compelled us to bivouac on its bank opposite the town. And here we endeavoured to make ourselves as comfortable for the night as circumstances would allow, in a wretched encampment teeming with mosquitoes and frogs, and reeking with malaria exhaled from putrid vegetation on the margin of the river.

But now no more sombre thoughts, for sleep cradled in the arms of fatigue had lulled dull care to rest; while all life, too, reposed in the quietude of a serenely lovely night, and nothing but the monotonous clink of the sentinels‘ scabbards, trailing along the ground as they paced to and fro, stirred the profound silence of the slumbering camp.

On the following morning as the sun rose, we rose too, and the forward movement began through a country in general feature similar to that we had recently traversed, but apparently without any signs of anarchy in it. In fact, there was nothing to indicate a hostile country ; and in proof of its tranquillity, over the vast expanse of the plains, as far as the scope of vision, on every side corn was sprouting in the greatest exuberance; and commissariat supplies were found in