104 THE OUT-STATION; OK, 



In a moment I was by his side, but not a groan 

 could I hear, or any thing to indicate the least sign of 

 life ; his pulse had ceased, and, of course, I concluded 

 he was as dead as Demosthenes ! 



Not a soul either was within sight, and we had 

 wandered into the most remote part of the plain, 

 from which it would take a very clever person to 

 retrace his steps to any particular point. 



It was as awkward a predicament as ever I was 

 in during the whole of my jungle experience. To 

 lose one's way with a living man is bad enough; 

 but imagine yourself, reader, lost to every trace of a 

 civilised world, and left in a pathless wilderness, a 

 lonely watcher of the dead ! Till you have experi- 

 enced such an ordeal (which I hope you never may) 

 you can never have an idea of the awful, wild excite- 

 ment of such a catastrophe. 



Every thing that I could imagine, that might recall 

 the vital spark, was tried, but in vain; and I might, 

 as likely as not, have perished of starvation by the 

 side of the lifeless man, or in the further wilderness 

 of the plain, had not one of our dogs luckily dis- 

 covered the spot where we were lying, and presently 

 set up such a yelling and barking, as brought two of 

 our followers to the spot. 



Lifting the body, that we still supposed to be soul- 

 less, across the horse, we were guided back to the 

 bungalow; and never felt I such pleasurable sensations 

 in my existence as the first faint sigh that broke from 



