"I hadn't expected this and my boots were hidden away somewhere in the hold while I was lying under a rug reading—however I got the boatman to get my boots and, infected by the haste of all leaving the boat, jumped out with my boots in my hand, one foot deep in soft mud, and climbed with one or two up a slope twenty feet above the boat where there was a hollow where we had cover—here with the whistle of a bullet and a smack on the rock above to make me hurry, I got my boots on! Then I reálized that we had abandoned the boats and that my things were on board still, so as I saw the "crew" was getting off too, I ran down shouted at him to get my suitcase and he brought it to the road, which was about half way at the slope; he also got my rug, but when I asked for my bedding-roll he had had enough as ten or so bandits were now crossing the river in a rowing boat to finish their job, "Anyhow, I would have found it difficult to manage more than I had, so I started off along the road after the rest of the passengers while a couple of other shots helped to keep me "windy." For a hundred yards er so I was in full view of the boat coming across and quite a biggish target—I felt enormous! I humped my bag on my back-to act as a shield at for my head and trotted eff. Then trying to hoist the bag into a less uncomfortable place on a shoulder, it caught in my spectacles which disappeared in the grass beside the road and then I groped for them for a couple of minutes (probably less I couldn't find them and had to go on without them and was soon round a bend in the road and in cover.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.