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Familiarity with the detail of the room engendered frantic loathing. His brain conned over the faded colors in the rag rug and encountered the unchangeable, bayonet-like crack in the mirror with nervous fury. No peace came with the darkness. Each familiar thing persisted, looming clearer to his tired mind by the very effort his straining eyes made to reach it.
Every now and then one darts its long bayonet-like beak into the water, invariably drawing it out with a fish between the mandibles; this, after a short convulsive struggle, and a flutter or two of its tail fins, disappearing down the crane's capacious throat. "Having their breakfast," observes the gaucho, "or, I should rather call it dinner," he adds, with a glance upward to the sky.
The palmilla, standing like a huge porcupine upon the plain, cannot be mistaken; and he descries it at more than a mile's distance, the shadow of his own head already flickering among its bayonet-like blades. Just then something else comes under his eyes, which at once changes the expression upon his countenance. From gay it grows grave, serious, apprehensive.
The bayonet-like line of bamboos checked them; and the arrows of the concealed defenders told, with terrible effect, on the struggling mass. At last, at many points, the ditch was literally filled with dead; and the assailants were enabled to leap upon the line of bamboos which had so long checked their passage. The advantage was but slight.
There are a million books, and yet with all their aid I cannot tell you the colour of the May dandelion. There are three greens at this moment in my mind: that of the leaf of the flower-de-luce, that of the yellow iris leaf, and that of the bayonet-like leaf of the common flag. With admission to a million books, how am I to tell you the difference between these tints?
Finally, the plucky little beast seemed to come to the conclusion that the decisive moment had arrived, for, suddenly placing his head between his fore legs, so that his long, powerful horns pointed straight at his opponent's body, he hurled himself violently forward, like a bolt shot from a catapult; the sharp, bayonet-like horns buried themselves deeply in the grey-spotted, blood-smeared body; and as a prolonged yell of agony rent the air the antelope turned a complete somersault over his antagonist and staggered to his feet, bewildered but unhurt, the force with which the final stroke had been delivered having been so tremendous that the horns had disengaged themselves by the simple process of tearing two ghastly slashes in the fearfully lacerated carcass of the now defunct enemy.
The Indian cotton-tree looms up beside the South American aloe this last, with its thick, bayonet-like leaves, is ornamented in wavy lines like the surface of a Toledo blade. The grouping of these exotics, natives of regions so far apart on the earth's surface, yet quite domesticated here, forms an incongruous though pleasing picture.
Then the scene changed, as things move in dreams, and I was at work on Bishop's farm. I was cutting and shocking corn, and the boss of the hired help swore because I was so slow. My hands were bleeding from scratches where the sharp edges of the bayonet-like blades had cut them, and I was so hungry and tired that I was ready to lie down and die.
A half-naked sinewy Navajo with a face as changeless as a bronze mask sat astride August's blindfolded roan, Charger. He rode bareback except for a blanket strapped upon the horse; he carried only a long, thick halter, with a loop and a knot. When August opened the improvised gate, with its sharp bayonet-like branches of cedar, the Indian rode into the corral. The watchers climbed to the knoll.
They were mounted on the spurs of the hills, sunk in pits, ambushed in the thick pine woods. Every step forward was made cautiously between trenches, or through mazes of barb-wire and iron hurdles with bayonet-like spikes. Even walking leisurely you had to watch your step. Pits opened suddenly at your feet, and strands of barbed-wire caught at your clothing.
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