pon this narrow escape. Narrow it certainly was, for had not Caspar
and Ossaroo arrived in the "nick of time," as Caspar expressed it, and
acted as promptly as they had, poor Karl would never have lived to thank
them.

"Well," said Caspar, "I think I may call this one of my lucky days; and
yet I don't know about that, since it has come so near being fatal to
both my companions."

"Both?" inquired Karl, with some surprise.

"Indeed, yes, brother," answered Caspar. "Yours is the second life I've
had a hand in saving to-day."

"What! has Ossaroo been in danger, _too_? Ha! he is quite wet--every
rag upon his body!" said Karl, approaching the shikarree, and laying
hand upon his garments. "Why, so are you, Caspar,--dripping wet, I
declare! How is this? You've been in the lake? Have you been in
danger of drowning?"

"Why, yes," replied Caspar. "Ossy has." (Caspar frequently used this
diminutive for Ossaroo.) "I might say worse than drowning. Our comrade
has been near a worse fate--that of being _swallowed up_!"

"Swallowed up!" exclaimed Karl, in astonishment. "Swallowed up! What
mean you, brother?"

"I mean just what I have said--that Ossaroo has been in great danger of
being swallowed up,--body, bones, and all,--so that we would never have
found a trace of him!"

"Oh! Caspar, you must be jesting with me;--there are no whales in the
lake to make a Jonah of our poor shikarree; nor sharks neither, nor any
sort of fish big enough to bolt a full-grown man. What, then, can you
mean?"

"In truth, brother, I am quite serious. We have been very near losing
our comrade,--almost as near as he and I have been of losing you; so
that, you see, there has been a double chance against your life; for if
Ossaroo had not been saved, neither he nor I would have been here in
time to lend you a hand, and both of you in that ease would have
perished. What danger have I been in of losing both? and then what
would have been my forlorn fate? Ah! I cannot call it a lucky day,
after all. A day of perils--even when one has the good fortune to
escape them--is never a pleasant one to be remembered. No--I shudder
when I think of the chances of this day!"

"But come, Caspar!" interposed the botanist, "explain yourself! Tell me
what has happened to get both of you so saturated with water. Who or
what came so near swallowing Ossaroo? Was it fish, flesh, or fowl?"

"A fish, I should think," added Karl, in a jocular way, "jud