Sometimes people rushed from the fields where they were working to the
banks to watch us. Dark men, with bare chests, and as hairy as monkeys;
women, likewise a good deal bare, with heads covered by great sun-bonnets,
and children burnt by the sun to the colour of young Arabs, stood and gazed
speechless with astonishment. Who were we in this strange-looking boat that
went so fast, and whence had we come? They knew that we must have come a
long, long way; but, how did we do it? How did we get over the _barrages_?
These were the thoughts that puzzled them. No boat had ever been known to
treat the obstacles of the Dronne in this jaunty fashion before.
Several more weirs were passed; one with great difficulty, for the canoe
had to be dragged and jolted thirty or forty yards through the corner of a
wood. Then the evening fell again when we were following the windings of a
swift current that ran now to the right and now to the left of what seemed
to be a broad marsh covered with reeds and sedges. Sometimes the current
carried us into banks gloomy with drooping alders, or densely fringed with
brambles. When I heard squeals behind, I knew that Hugh was diving through
a blackberry-bush, or a hanging garden of briars.
Pages:
329
330
331
332
333
334
335
336
337
338
339
340
341
342
343
344
345
346
347
348
349
350
351
352
353