It
Seemed Almost Sacrilege To Tear And Bruise And Break Them And Push
Rudely Through Them In Our Canoe.
A sadder and lonelier scene could not
be.
I have seldom been more powerfully affected by nature. The lake
lying in hot mist under dark clouds, with the swamp and jungle on one
side and an absolutely impenetrable wall of entangled trees and
trailers on the other, so dense and matted that before putting one's
feet on shore space would have to be cut for them with a parang, seemed
as if it must be a hundred miles from the abodes of men, and as if
nobody had ever been there before or ever would be there again. The
heavy mist lifted, showing mountains, range beyond range,
forest-covered, extending back into the heart of the peninsula; and
though the highest may be under five thousand feet in height, yet from
their shape, and from rising so near the sea-level, and from the woolly
mists which hung round their bases, and from something in the gray, sad
atmosphere, they looked fully ten thousand feet high.
Captain Walker climbed into a low tree which overhung the lake to look
out for teal and widgeon, which were perfectly innumerable, while the
Malays, never uttering a word, silently poled the boat over the dreary
lake in the dreary evening to put up the birds. There they went high
over our heads in long flights, and every time there was the report of
a gun there were screams and shrieks and squawks, and myriads of birds
rose out of their reedy covers, and fish splashed, and the smoke lay
heavily on the water, and then all was silent again.
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