328 TRAVEL, ADVENTURE, AND SPORT. 



walked away from the shore and then again returned 

 to it, until at last he was surprised by the first beams 

 of the sun, disclosing to him a scene whose sight 

 assisted him to a prompt decision. 



Agreeably with what Canondah had told him, he 

 .found the left bank of the Sabine bare of trees, with 

 the exception of a few stunted firs and cedars growing 

 along the shore. Before him was spread a landscape 

 which the most skilful pencil could but imperfectly 

 sketch, the most powerful fancy with difficulty con- 

 ceive. It was an interminable tract of meadow land, 

 its long grass waving in the morning breeze, present- 

 ing an endless succession of gentle undulations, whilst 

 in the far distance isolated groups of trees appeared 

 to rock like ships upon the boundless ocean. Xo- 

 where was a fixed point to be seen, and the whole 

 stupendous landscape swam before his eyes, waving 

 like the surface of the sea in a soft tropical breeze. 

 Towards the north, the plain rose gradually into 

 highlands, between whose picturesque clusters of 

 trees his eye penetrated to the extremity of the vast 

 panorama, where the bright tints of the landscape 

 blended with those of the horizon. Eastward the 

 huge meadow sank down into bottoms, shaded by 

 trees, and overgrown with reeds and palmettos, shin- 

 ing, as the wind stirred them, like sails in the sun- 

 shine. The profound stillness of the sky-bounded 

 plain, only broken by the plash of the water-fowl, or 

 the distant howl of the savanna wolf, and the splen- 



