298 
VISITS TO MADAGASCAR. 
CHAP. XI. 
It was all water or marshy ground, and we found no place to 
lie down and sleep on, except when we came to a tree, or a 
piece of ground somewhat raised and dry. We frequently 
came upon crocodiles, sometimes trod upon them, and when 
we laid down at night we smelt them (near us).” 
Three of the fugitives were present when I first read their 
narrative, and on my pausing and expressing my wonder, 
asking if they really did tread on the reptiles, and inquiring 
how they ever escaped, they said, when the crocodile was in 
the water, or saw its prey before it, it was ferocious and irre¬ 
sistible, but when they trod upon it in the swamp, it seemed 
greatly frightened, and instead of attacking them, seemed 
to try to get away, or to penetrate deeper into the mud. 
The writer of the account continues: “We did not expect 
to live, or ever to see men again, for we thought we should 
die in that swamp. But after nine days we came to an open 
country, and when we had proceeded a short distance, we came 
to a place where there were great numbers of water lilies 
growing. We gathered and ate the leaves of the lilies, and 
remained five days in the place where we found this food. 
When we went on again we soon came to a broad river, where 
we stopped two days, and cut a large quantity of long coarse 
grass, which we tied in a bundle, to serve the purpose of a 
raft; we also made a rope of long grass with which to draw the 
raft ac'ross the river. Then I swam with one end of the rope 
to the other side of the river. My wife and a woman pushed 
the bundle of grass into the water, placed their bundles and 
the little child on the top of the raft of grass, and I pulled it 
across, while the women swam one on each side of the bundle 
to keep it upright, and so all reached the shore safely, though 
the stream was rapid, and there were numbers of crocodiles in 
the river.” * 
But to continue the narrative of my own journey. Soon 
* MS. account of perils on account of Christianity. 
