184 LARGE GAME. chap. iv. 



It was here, where I could see the stars, that I first 

 discovered that I had been going exactly in the wrong 

 direction, and that, as I had been wandering about for up- 

 wards of an hour, there was no saying how far I might have 

 penetrated into the heart of the reeds ; it was at any rate 

 quite plain that I could not hope to find my way out that 

 night, and that if I again risked myself among the un- 

 known mud-swamps and lagoons that intervened I should 

 probably have to watch till daylight to protect myself 

 from the crocodiles which during the hours of darkness 

 wander about in search of food, and the knowledge of whose 

 vicinity would effectually prevent sleep, although perhaps 

 when outside I might scout the idea of their attacking a 

 living human being on dry land. 



There was a great island-like patch of reeds nearly in 

 the centre of this open, and I determined to take up my 

 quarters there, as nothing could then come near me with- 

 out my seeing it. The spot was dry too, and by no means 

 an uncomfortable lair, and I set about making my position 

 as bearable as I could, thankful that I had at any rate 

 escaped from the noisome, fever-producing pools of stagnant 

 water that had hitherto surrounded me. I had a flint 

 and steel, tobacco and pipe ; so, after hunting round and 

 round the edge of the reeds for such dry stems as I could 

 find, and carrying several successive bundles of them to 

 my temporary camp, I collected from amongst the long 

 grass enough that was sufficiently withered to serve as 

 tinder, and, lighting my pipe, I knocked the glowing ashes 

 into it, and soon blew it up into a flame, which, as I heaped 

 the dry stems over it, after clearing the ground in the 

 vicinity to prevent any danger of a general conflagration, 



