A FOREST FIRE 191 



bandolier contained about twenty rounds, and I had 

 matches in my pocket. And a man with a compass 

 is never lost. The question which troubled me was 

 where to spend the nights. If I slept in the fork 

 of a tree, a leopard might be my bedfellow ; if on 

 the ground, a lion. 



Before starting I climbed a high tree, and, to my 

 delight, saw a column of smoke rising some miles off. 

 I took its bearing, and, quite prepared to find it an 

 ordinary though late forest fire, made for it. Many 

 acres of grass had been burned by the time I reached 

 it. By the way, these fires do practically no damage 

 to adult trees. I dashed through the flames, no great 

 feat, and climbed a tree, the smouldering bark of those 

 passed by the fire rendering them insurmountable. 

 Again Providence befriended me, for another growing 

 column of smoke convinced me that the first fire was 

 no accidental one. I soon came on my party after 

 three to four hours' wandering. We moved off imme- 

 diately all the party had reassembled, for, with my 

 continued absence, it had halted and sent out scouts 

 to look for me, whom the shots we fired as signals 

 recalled. We were marching along the outer edge 

 of a plain about a mile wide, through which ran a 

 khor. We came on an isolated wood, about five hun- 

 dred yards in length and fifty in breadth. It was thick 

 with giant ferns, and I fancy it must have been one of 

 the gallery woods described by early explorers of these 

 parts. With its immense trees, it looked, as they de- 

 scribed it, like a cathedral in gala dress. 



Game was now fairly scarce. There were numbers 



