The Lake County star. [volume] (Chase, Mich.) 1873-current, 1874-07-09
A NIGHT in AN INDIAN JUNGLE.

NIGHT in AN INDIAN JUNGLE.
1t was close upon one o'clock i'm the
morning, and the moon shone brightly at
times through the fleecy clouds that were
gliding swiftly across the disk, before the
bearers had vanished, and the other had
allowed his torch to 60 out, from careless
ness or fright, but this did not much sig
nifty, as there was sufficient moonlight
for the bearers to see the road; that is to
say, if rutty track through the jungle
conld with any sense of propriety be
g. termed a road. 1t was beautiful bam-
boo jungle that Jack WaldrOn and were
travelling through, and for long time
gave myself up to watching, with much
interest, the graceful waving clumps of
that gigantic cane, as we passed them
slowly, the bearers stumbling and kick
ing their way over ruts and stones with
do eful groans, and grunts full of mysery.
l thought to myself what fine place for
pea-fowl we must be in; and then reflect
ing that pea-fowl and tigers are not un-
commonly found together. began to
wonder if there were any of the striped
gentry prOwlng in the forest; for, al
though the word jungle is here used i'm
the common acceptatiOn of the Indian
term, which embraces everything arbores-
cent, from the mightiest forests to the
most Insignificant bruswood, it was, in
fact, a bamboo forest we were in, with
forests glades to the right and left of the
road, and having canes of extraordinary
girth and lOftiness, even for that part oil
India. Smoking and looking out of the
palanquin window, in the faint hope of
discovering some wild animal crossing
the glades in the moonlight, / must have
almost uncOnsciously got a pretty good
idea of the road, for l remembered it
generally distinct enough afterward,
when l had to travel it under less COM
Portable circumstances. But there were
no wild animals to be seen of the kind l
was looking for. Jackals raised their
unearthly cry now and then i'm the re-
cesses of the jungle, and the great
horned owl fitted across the road from
one patch of bamboo to another; but O
well considering that we had left our
guns and rifles at kindly, waiting our
return, and had not even pistol between
us. 1t was hard to get any information
out of the bearers regarding the charac-
ter of the road, for they spoke Telegu,
and had but very slight acquaintance
with Hindustani; and, besides this, they
were sulky, so that having tried to get
some information from them in vain l
gave it up as bad job, and throwing
away the end of my cherOOt composed
myself to sleep.
don't think could have slept more
than half an hour when was awakened,
this time by the renewed clamor of the
bearers, who, crowding about the door of
my palanquin, which they had allowed
to fall roughly OH the ground, chattering
altogether with surprising vOlubility and
excitement. At first half.asleep as was,
/ could not make out what they wanted
but when gathered that my friend Wal
dron was seized with the cholera was
alarmed indeed, and crawled out of the
palanquin as speedily asI could to render
him assistance. The bearers were all as
frightened and helpless as flock of sheep
with wolf In their midst, and / could
see that they were perfectly panic-strick-
EN-. On reaching Waldron's palanquin,
which was a hundred yards or so ahead
of mine, i found my friend, as | thought,
very ill, and, as he family assured me,
suffering from all the symptoms of chol-
era. What was to be done? We had no
medicine but quinine, and it was vain TO
look for any. Fortunately, we had
brandy, without which an Indian trav-
cler rarely journeys, and of this l made
Waldron swallow considerable quantity
neat. Then / ran back to call the bearers
A. IL
but imagine my dismay when j discOv-
cred that they had one and all disap-
pcared / shouted and called without
cffect There was no answer. / ran
back upon our road for some distance at
my best speed, but could see no one. |
shouted againa and again, threatened and
entreated by turns, but only to the trees
of the forests for not-a bearer was to be
seen. At last / was obliged to own to
myself that we were deserted and with
no little CONSERVATION returned to my
sick friend. He was apparently worse
and could scarcely speak; and yet /
could do nothing for him. Suddenly
the thought flashed across my mind that
/ might return to the village we had
left, and with the aid of the head man
and the bungalo peOn compel another set
of bearers to accompany me. / told
AWaldron of this at once, and my poor
friend, who was by this time so nervous
and weak as scarcely to be able to under
stand what / said, silently squeezed my
hand-a gesture / accepted as an assent.
There was no time to be lost; wrapped
blanket around him, and set off upon
my lonely errand by the Pickering light
of the moon.
At first i was too much engrossed at
poor Waldron's piteous state to think
much of my surroundings; and ] had
gone over perhaps half the distance that
divided us from the last stage we had left
when became painfully aware that was
in very awkward predicament myself.
Il was that part of the road where the
bamboos grew thickly, and was passing
great cluster of canes whose feathery
leaves obscured the light, when tripped
over stone and fell fiat on the road.
was not much hurt-only my knee
bruised but ingetting up again to brush
the dirt off my. clothes | happened to
look back, and an indescribable sensa-
tion of awe came over me at what I saw
in my tracks: There mos tiger followiny
me. At first would not believe it; /
reasoned with myself that such circum-
stance was impossible al am nervous.
tired, anxious, and have perhaps an at
tack Of fever coming on,' said TO N.Y.
self, "and that dark thing there In the
road that fancy is tiger crouchinp -
no ti ger at all hut only Is shadow of a
stone. It's all nonsense. Think @
WalIron and step out" | did so encour-