Page:An account of a savage girl.djvu/63

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been validated.
A wild Girl.
35

with one hand, and using the other by way of pillow.

The largest rivers did not at all stop their journey either by day or night; for they alwise crossed them without any dread: Sometimes they entered them merely for the sake of drinking, which they performed by dipping in their chin up to the mouth, and sucking the water like horses. But they most frequently entered the rivers to catch the fishes they perceived at the bottom, which they brought ashore in their hands and mouths, there to open, skin, and eat them, as I have mentioned above.

Having hinted to Madamoiselle Le Blanc, that I had great difficulty to believe it possible for her to make her way out of a deep river, in the manner she mentioned, without the assistance of her hands and breath; she assured me, that without such assistance she always mounted to the surface of the water, a very little breath being alone sufficient for that purpose, of which she had given an example only four years ago. Of this she showed me the manner, standing upright, with both her arms held streight up, as if holding something above the water, having the end of her handkerchief between her teeth, like a fish, breathing at the same time softly, but without interruption, with each corner of hermouth