From time to time
our march is disordered and bustled by the yielding of a swamp. The
road becomes a marsh which we cross on our heels, while our feet
make the sound of sculling. Planks have been laid in it here and
there. Where they have so far sunk in the mud as to proffer their
edges to us we slip on them. Sometimes there is enough water to
float them, and then under the weight of a man they splash and go
under, and the man stumbles or falls, with frenzied imprecations.
It must be five o'clock. The stark and affrighting scene unfolds
itself to our eyes, but it is still encircled by a great fantastic
ring of mist and of darkness. We go on and on without pause, and
come to a place where we can make out a dark hillock, at the foot of
which there seems to be some lively movement of human beings.
"Advance by twos," says the leader of the detachment. "Let each team
of two take alternately a plank and a hurdle." We load ourselves up.
One of the two in each couple assumes the rifle of his partner as
well as his own. The other with difficulty shifts and pulls out from
the pile a long plank, muddy and slippery, which weighs full eighty
pounds, or a hurdle of leafy branches as big as a door, which he can
only just keep on his back as he bends forward with his hands aloft
and grips its edges.
We resume our march, very slowly and very ponderously, scattered
over the now graying road, with complaints and heavy curses which
the effort strangles in our throats.
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