Page 277 - Malay sketches

A PERSONAL INCIDENT
shore. I at once told him that if his story was
true I could not at and must on at
stop Blanja go
once. How far he had been acting before was
doubtful, but his surprise now was genuine enough.
He "It is down
said, impossible, the whole country
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 out-
side 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
believe man in the boat I can
every certainly
speak for myself believed that he had started on
a journey of which sudden death was the inevitable
bourne.
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