I bent forward, as well as my constrained position would permit; and, with frenzied fingers, commenced tearing up the sand. I could barely reach the surface; and the little hollow I was able to make, filled up almost as soon as it had been formed. A thought occurred to me. My rifle might support me, placed horizontally. I looked around for it. It was not to be seen. It had sunk beneath the sand! Could I throw my body flat, and prevent myself from sinking deeper? No. The water was two feet in depth. I should drown at once! This last hope left me as soon as formed. I could think of no plan to save myself. I could make no further effort. A strange stupor seized upon me. My very thoughts became paralyzed. I knew that I was going mad. For a moment _I was mad_! After an interval, my senses returned. I made an effort to rouse my mind from its paralysis, in order that I might meet death--which I now believed to be certain--as a man should. I stood erect. My eyes had sunk to the prairie level, and rested upon the still bleeding victims of my cruelty. My heart smote me at the sight. Was I suffering a retribution of God? With humbled and penitent thoughts, I turned my face to heaven, almost dreading that some sign of omnipotent anger would scowl upon me from above. But no. The sun was shining as bright as ever; and the blue canopy of the world was without a cloud. I gazed upward, and prayed, with an earnestness known only to the hearts of men in positions of peril like mine. As I continued to look up, an object attracted my attention. Against the sky, I distinguished the outlines of a large dark bird. I knew it to be the obscene bird of the plains--the buzzard-vulture. Whence had it come? Who knows? Far beyond the reach of human eye, it had seen, or scented, the slaughtered antelopes; and, on broad silent wing, was now descending to the feast of death. Presently another, and another, and many others, mottled the blue field of the heavens, curving and wheeling silently earthward. Then, the foremost swooped down upon the bank; and, after gazing around for a moment, flapped off toward its prey. In a few seconds the prairie was black with filthy birds, who clambered over the dead antelopes; and beat their wings against each other, while they tore out the eyes of the quarry with their fetid beaks. And now came gaunt wolves--sneaking and hungry--stealing out of the cactus-thicket; and loping, coward-like, over the green swells of the prairie. These, after a battle, drove away the vultures; and tore up the prey--all the while growling and snapping vengefully at each other. "Thank heaven! I shall at least be saved from this!" I was soon relieved from the sight. My eyes had sunk below the level of the bank. I had looked my last on the fair green earth. I could now see only the clayey walls that contained the river, and the water that ran unheeding past me.