Page:Malay Sketches.pdf/118

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MALAY SKETCHES

sea, but with half a mile of mud between you and anything like dry land, and at the same time assailed by three crocodiles quite big enough to kill you, is calculated to shock the strongest nerves.

After a short but exciting fight, the police beat off the scaly beasts with difficulty, and found the woman had been badly torn in legs, and arms, and neck.

Whilst the men were arranging to carry her back, no easy matter over half a mile of soft but sticky wet mud and ooze, she told her tale:

"I was sleeping," she said, “and had a vision. Two radiant Beings appeared to me and bid me rise and follow them, and they would show me a sight more glorious than is vouchsafed to mortals. Transported with joy, I rose and followed them, and whilst filled with ecstatic rapture by the companionship of these Celestial Beings, I scemed to be borne along without effort of my own through enchanted ficlds of more than earthly beauty. Suddenly I was awakened by feeling the teeth of a crocodile in my leg, and, to my horror, I found I was out here on this mud-flat half a mile from home, but close to the sea, with three crocodiles attacking me, no means of defending myself, and little hope of help. I fell, and the beasts tore and worried me, biting my arms, and

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