OF THE OLD WOULD. i52o 



ally salted, and packed up a few marrow-bones, we 

 superintended the "bushing" of the game, and 

 shouldering our rifles again made a start, AVe 

 followed a course parallel to the crest of the ravine, 

 taking care not to go too close to the edge, as the 

 turf was smooth and slippery, and in some places 

 we might have fallen several thousand feet before 

 reaching the ground. 



We now entered a forest of gigantic teak-trees, 

 so dense that the rays of the sun never penetrated, 

 and the light resembled faint and dubious twilight. 

 None but those who have explored an Indian forest 

 could have any conception of the depth of gloom 

 and strange silence that pervades these solitudes. 

 Emerging from the dense forest-jungle that covered 

 the high ridge along which our course had hitherto 

 lain, we descended through a rocky gorge into a 

 beautiful valley clothed with short luxuriant emer- 

 ald-green grass, through which a softly-murmur- 

 ing stream of clear pellucid water glided smoothly 

 along until it plunged over a jutting cliff, when, 

 bounding from ledge to ledge, it formed a succes- 

 sion of foaming cataracts, and at last, rushing in its 

 headlong course down the almost perpendicular 

 slope of the mountain, swept over the scarped pre- 

 cipice at the end of the ravine in which we had 

 built our hut. 



We made our way to the first fall, and lying flat 

 upon the ground, crawled to the edge of the preci- 

 pice, and peeping cautiously over, we beheld a scene 



