A ^Thousand-Mile Walk 



of my inability to determine its depth. In many 

 places I was compelled to turn back, after 

 wading forty or fifty yards, and to try again 

 a score of times before I succeeded in getting 

 across a single lagoon. 



At length, after miles of wading and wallow 

 ing, I arrived at the grand cat-brier encamp 

 ment which guarded the whole forest in solid 

 phalanx, unmeasured miles up and down across 

 my way. Alas ! the trail by which I had crossed 

 in the morning was not to be found, and night 

 was near. In vain I scrambled back and forth 

 in search of an opening. There was not even a 

 strip of dry ground on which to rest. Every 

 where the long briers arched over to the vines 

 and bushes of the watery swamp, leaving 

 no standing-ground between them. I began to 

 think of building some sort of a scaffold in a 

 tree to rest on through the night, but concluded 

 to make one more desperate effort to find the 

 narrow track. 



After calm, concentrated recollection of my 

 course, I made a long exploration toward the 



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