This was only the first half of the proceedings. But I must interrupt my narrative here in order to turn the living light of my memory upon Bashan. There are a number of coined phrases and ready-made figures of speech which I might use for describing his behaviour—current terms—terms which in most cases would be both valid and appropriate. I might say, for example, that he was thunderstruck. But this term does not please me, and I do not wish to use it. Big words, the big, well-worn words, are not very suitable for expressing the extraordinary. One may best achieve this by intensifying the small words and forcing them to ascend to the very acme of their meaning. So I will say no more than that Bashan _started_ at the report of the gun and the accompanying phenomena—and that this starting was the same as that which is peculiar to him when confronted with something striking, and that all this was well known to me though it was now elevated to the _n_th degree. It was a start which flung his whole body backward, wobbling to right and left, a start which jerked his head in rash recoil against his chest and which, in recovering himself, almost tore his head from his shoulders, a start which seemed to cry from every fibre of his being: “What, what! _What_ was that? Hold! in the name of a hundred thousand devils! _How_ was that!” He listened to—he regarded everything with a kind of indignation such as extremes of surprise are apt to cause—drank everything in, as it were, and there in his heart of hearts these things were already existing—there, in some form or other they had always been—no matter what astounding novelties may have been sprung upon him here. Yes, whenever these things came upon him, causing him to leap to the right and the left and turn himself half around his own axis, it always seemed to me as though he were attempting to catch a glimpse of himself and inquiring: “What am I? Who am I? Am I really I?” At the very moment in which the corpse of the duck fell upon the water, Bashan made a leap forward, towards the edge of the escarpment, as though he wished to go down into the river-bed and plunge himself into the water. But then he thought of the current, clamped the brakes upon this sudden impulse, grew ashamed, and once more confined his efforts to staring. I regarded him with anxiety. After the fall of the duck, I was of the opinion that we had seen enough, and proposed that we should go on. But he had already sat himself down upon his haunches. His face, with ears erected to their utmost extent, was addressed towards the other bank, and when I said to him: “Well, Bashan, shall we go on?” he merely gave a flirt of his head in my direction, as though one should say, not without a certain rudeness: “Please do not disturb me!” and kept on looking. And so I gave in, crossed my feet, leaned on my stick, and also went on watching to see what might now take place.