"I must have a bath to-night," said Shaw. "How is it, Delorier? Any
chance for a swim down here?"

"Ah! I cannot tell; just as you please, monsieur," replied Delorier,
shrugging his shoulders, perplexed by his ignorance of English, and
extremely anxious to conform in all respects to the opinion and wishes
of his bourgeois.

"Look at his moccasion," said I. "It has evidently been lately immersed
in a profound abyss of black mud."

"Come," said Shaw; "at any rate we can see for ourselves."

We set out together; and as we approached the bushes, which were at some
distance, we found the ground becoming rather treacherous. We could
only get along by stepping upon large clumps of tall rank grass, with
fathomless gulfs between, like innumerable little quaking islands in
an ocean of mud, where a false step would have involved our boots in a
catastrophe like that which had befallen Delorier's moccasins. The thing
looked desperate; we separated, so as to search in different directions,
Shaw going off to the right, while I kept straight forward. At last I
came to the edge of the bushes: they were young waterwillows, covered
with their caterpillar-like blossoms, but intervening between them
and the last grass clump was a black and deep slough, over which, by a
vigorous exertion, I contrived to jump. Then I shouldered my way through
the willows, tramping them down by main force, till I came to a wide
stream of water, three inches deep, languidly creeping along over a
bottom of sleek mud. My arrival produced a great commotion. A huge green
bull-frog uttered an indignant croak, and jumped off the bank with a
loud splash: his webbed feet twinkled above the surface, as he jerked