9 
50 LUDICROUS INCIDENT. 
while pretty silver-marked helmet-beetles alighted 
on tlie sunlit blades of horizontal leaves. The 
loud grating noise of the tree-crickets, or cicadse, 
vibrated through the otherwise silent leafy wilder- 
ness without a moment of cessation. 
A ludicrous incident happened here to my friend 
B . Anxious to explore the tiger-haunted pre- 
cincts of one of the deserted villages, he was 
confronted on his way by a stream. Nothing 
daunted, however, by the obstacle, he plunged in 
and swam to the opposite bank. Here he found a 
smouldering wood-lire, Avhich he gaily replenished, 
and before which he hung up his dripping inex- 
pressibles on a stick to dry. In the somewhat 
primitive costume in which he now appeai’ed, he 
proceeded to examine, with the eye of a hunter, the 
tracks of rhinoceros and other “ferae naturae,’’ 
which, he stated, did greatly abound there. Hav- 
ing satisfied even his curiosity, our young friend 
returned to the bank of the stream to reclaim his 
nether habiliments. Alas! nothing but a burnt 
shred was visible. What could he do in these 
