When we had accomplished about half the distance a horrible shiver, or tremor, seemed to stir the whole surface of the mud, and we both sank to our knees in slime. I never felt such fear before: I did not need any one to tell me what that ghastly tremor prognosticated; I knew we were on a quick-sand, or rather quick-mud, and that the tide must be coming in, and the prospect of being sucked down and smothered in reeking ooze was not a pleasant one. We drew our legs from the quivering mass, and tried to run in the direction in which we had left our boat. Worse and worse: we sank deeper and deeper at every step, the darkness, too, grew ever denser; we feared that our boat had been carried away by the rising tide, and we knew not which way to turn to extricate ourselves—assistance, we well knew, there was none. As the mud appeared a little firmer to our left we moved on to it, and waited in silence, panting and breathless from our late exertions. The birds, who had been the cause of our getting into this fix, came wheeling round overhead, and their cries echoed weirdly in the deathly stillness of the night. I said to the doctor—
"Let us fire off our guns together—somebody may hear us—It's our only chance."
"I don't think it's any use."
