A PERSONAL INCIDENT
shore. I at once told him that if his story was true I could not stop at Blanja and must go on at once. How far he had been acting before was doubtful, but his surprise now was genuine enough. He said, "It is impossible, the whole country down stream is in arms, you cannot pass, it is certain destruction." We told him that whatever it was we were going, and we pointed out to him that as the boat was moving into deep water he had not much time to get out if he wanted to return to the shore. He got out, and it was rather deep, but he stood there and shouted, "No doubt you think yourselves very fine fellows, but you will be killed all the same."
He was still standing in the same place when we had gone some distance, and as we passed outside the long line of boats the many people on shore realised that we had started again and were rapidly dropping down stream. It seemed to us that for them the unexpected had happened.
The pleasure of thinking that we had at any rate cheated the Blanja people did not last us long and I believe every man in the boat—certainly I can speak for myself—believed that he had started on a journey of which sudden death was the inevitable bourne,
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