"I will do anything," he added piteously, "if you will only be quiet
and not try to hang yourself any more in that horrible netting."
I would not hear of my friend leaving his bed, and after one or two more
mischances self and hammock were suspended for the night at an angle a
trifle too low for the head. Except for the honour and glory of the
thing, perhaps I might have slept as well on the floor; but one does not
carry a patent contrivance all across Europe to be balked of its use
after all.
My friend woke me once during the night by shaking me roughly. He said I
had nightmare, and made "such a devil of a row that he could not sleep."
I have some dreamy recollection of finding myself in a London
drawing-room in the inexpressibly scanty garments of a Rusniack, and
when I turned to leave in all decent haste I found the way barred by an
insolent fellow with the head of a buffalo bull. When I awoke in the
early morning I found my friend already dressed and rather sulky. He
observed that he had never met a man so addicted to nightmare as myself,
adding, that another time if I must sleep in my hammock, it would be
better to see that the head was higher than the feet.
"It does not make any difference to me," I replied cheerfully, "I am as
fresh as a lark."
There was no time for further discussion, for our breakfast was ready (a
very bad breakfast it was, too), and the vehicle we had chartered the
night before was also waiting to convey us some miles into the interior
of the country, to the soda manufactory at Boeska.
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