CHAPTER VII.
With the return of consciousness, I at first had a vague impression that I was lying somewhere, injured, and incapable of motion; that it was night, and necessary for me to keep my eyes fast shut to prevent them from being blinded by almost continuous vivid flashes of lightning.
Injured, and sore all over, but warm and dry--surely dry; nor was it lightning that dazzled, but firelight.

I began to notice things little by little.

The fire was burning on a clay floor a few feet from where I was lying.

Before it, on a log of wood, sat or crouched a human figure.
An old man, with chin on breast and hands clasped before his drawn-up knees; only a small portion of his forehead and nose visible to me.

An Indian I took him to be, from his coarse, lank, grey hair and dark brown skin.