XIII 



A RICKETY HAMMOCK 



THE next shoot was in the Bilaspur district, and 

 I meant to do the first march out in a bullock 

 cart and then ride, but the D.S. of Police was 

 on the spot and helped me most kindly by ordering 

 a tonga with fast- trotting bullocks to take me out. 

 The consequence was that I arrived at my destination 

 long before the servants and kit. It was evening 

 when I got there and the driver set me down at the 

 gates of the thana, the police station. The inspector 

 came out to meet me, and when he heard the cir- 

 cumstances of the case he said that I had better stay 

 and sleep inside the thana, and not wait about outside 

 for the things to arrive. He had a bedstead brought 

 and put into the courtyard, and alongside was a 

 row of cells, behind the iron bars of which stood, 

 looking on, gloomy-looking thieves and murderers, 

 at least they looked gloomy in the dusk. 



Before I could go to sleep the P.W. road surveyor 

 came in; he said I should be more comfortable in 

 his little hut, and so led me off to that and sent in a 

 chair and bedstead. The servants came in at night, 

 and next morning we started to cross the Mahanaddi,a 

 river which in the rains is, I should think, a quarter of 



a mile or more wide at that place ; but there was not 



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