nigh their
position. By the vacillating movements of some fifty or a hundred bulls,
that led the advance, it remained questionable, for many moments, what
course they intended to pursue. But a tremendous and painful roar, which
came from behind the cloud of dust that rose in the centre of the herd,
and which was horridly answered by the screams of the carrion birds,
that were greedily sailing directly above the flying drove, appeared to
give a new impulse to their flight, and at once to remove every symptom
of indecision. As if glad to seek the smallest signs of the forest, the
whole of the affrighted herd became steady in its direction, rushing
in a straight line toward the little cover of bushes, which has already
been so often named.

The appearance of danger was now, in reality, of a character to try the
stoutest nerves. The flanks of the dark, moving mass, were advanced in
such a manner as to make a concave line of the front, and every fierce
eye, that was glaring from the shaggy wilderness of hair in which the
entire heads of the males were enveloped, was riveted with mad anxiety
on the thicket. It seemed as if each beast strove to outstrip his
neighbour, in gaining this desired cover; and as thousands in the
rear pressed blindly on those in front, there was the appearance of an
imminent risk that the leaders of the herd would be precipitated on the
concealed party, in which case the destruction of every one of them was
certain. Each of our adventurers felt the danger of his situation in a
manner peculiar to his individual character and circumstances.

Middleton wavered. At times he felt inclined to rush through the bushes,
and, seizing Inez, attempt to fly. Then recollecting the impossibility
of outstripping the furious speed of an alarmed bison, he felt for his
arms, determined to make head against the countless drove. The faculties
of Dr. Battius were quickly wrought up to the very summit of mental
delusion. The dark forms of the herd lost their distinctness, and then
the naturalist began to fancy he beheld a wild collection of all the
creatures of the world, rushing upon him in a body, as if to revenge the
various injuries, which in the course of a life of indefatigable labour
in behalf of the natural sciences, he had inflicted on their several
genera. The paralysis it occasioned in his system, was like the effect
of the incubus. Equally unable to fly or to advance, he stood riveted
to the spot, until the inf