This was done accordingly, and in a short time they were walking along the edge of the jungle, each one straining his eyes for any indication of a trail. At first they met with no success, but finally Tom gave a whoop. “Here we are,” he yelled, “here’s a path, or something that looks a whole lot like one, leading straight into the forest. Come along, fellows,” and he started on a run along an almost obliterated trail that everybody else had overlooked.
You may be sure Bert and Dick were not far behind him, and were soon following close on his heels. After they had gone a short distance in this reckless fashion they were forced to slow down on account of the heat, which was overpowering. Also, as they advanced, the underbrush became thicker and thicker, and it soon became difficult to make any progress at all. Great roots and vines grew in tangled luxuriance across the path, and more than once one of them tripped and measured his length on the ground.
Soon they felt glad to be able to progress even at a walk, and Bert said, “We want to remember landmarks that we pass, fellows, so that we can be sure of finding our way back. It wouldn’t be very hard to wander off this apology of a path, and find ourselves lost.”
“Like the babes in the woods,” supplemented Dick, with a laugh.
“Exactly,” grinned Bert, “and I don’t feel like doing any stunts along that line myself just at present.”
These words were hardly out of his mouth when the path suddenly widened out into a little opening or glade, and the boys stopped abruptly to get their bearings.
“Look! over there, fellows,” said Bert, in an excited voice. “If I’m not very much mistaken there’s a hut over there, see, by that big tree—no, no, you simps, the big one with the wild grape vine twisted all over it. See it now?”
It was easy to see that they did, for they both hurried over toward the little shack at a run, but Bert had started even before they had, and beat them to it. They could gather little information from its contents when they arrived, however. Inside were a few ragged pieces of clothing, and in one corner a bed constructed of twigs and branches. In addition to these there was a rude chair constructed of boughs of trees, and tied together with bits of string and twine. It was evident from this, however, that some civilized person had at one time inhabited the place, and at a recent date, too, for otherwise the hut would have been in a more dilapidated condition than that in which they found it.
They rummaged around, scattering the materials of which the bed was constructed to left and right. Suddenly Tom gave a yell and pounced on something that he had unearthed.
“Why don’t you do as I do, pick things up and look for them afterward?” he said, excitedly.
“What is it? What did you find?” queried Bert, who was more inclined to be sure of his ground before he became enthusiastic. “It looks a good deal like any other old memorandum book, as far as I can see.”
“All right, then, we’ll read it and see whatisin it,” replied Tom. “Why, it’s a record of somebody’s life on the island here. I suppose maybe you think that’s nothing to find, huh?”
Without waiting for a reply he started to read the mildewed old book, and Bert and Dick read also, over his shoulder.
The first entry was dated about a month previous to the time of reading, and seemed to be simply a rough jotting down of the important events in the castaway’s life for future reference. There were records of the man, whoever he might be, having found the spring beside which he had built the hut in which they were now standing; of his having erected the rude shelter, and a good many other details.
The three boys read the scribbled account withbreathless interest, as Tom turned over page after page. “Come on, skip over to the last page,” said Bert at last, “we can read all this some other time, and I’m crazy to know what happened to the fellow, whoever he is. Maybe he’s written that down, too, since he seems to be so methodical.”
In compliance with this suggestion, Tom turned to the last written page of the note-book, and what the boys read there caused them to gasp. It was scribbled in a manner that indicated furious haste, and read as follows:
“Whoever you are who read this, for heaven’s sake come to my aid, if it is not too late. Last night I was awakened by having my throat grasped in a grip of iron, and before I could even start to struggle I was bound securely. By the light of torches held by my captors I could see that I was captured by a band of black-skinned savages. After securing me beyond any chance of escape, they paid little further attention to me, and held what was apparently a conference regarding my disposal. Finally they made preparations to depart, but first cooked a rude meal and my hands were unbound to enable me to eat. At the first opportunity I scrawled this account, in the hope that some party seeing my signal, might by chance find it, and be able to help me. As the savages travel I will try to leave some trace of ourprogress, so you can follow us. I only hope—” but here the message ended suddenly, leaving the boys to draw their own conclusions as to the rest of it.
For a few moments they gazed blankly into each other’s faces, and uttered never a word. Bert was the first to break the silence.
“I guess it’s up to us, fellows,” he said, and the manly lines of his face hardened. “We’ve got to do something to help that poor devil, and the sooner we start the better. According to the dates in this book it must have been last Thursday night that he was captured, and this is Monday. If we hurry we may be able to trace him up and do something for him before it’s too late.”
The thought that they themselves might be captured or meet with a horrible death did not seem to enter the head of one of them. They simply saw plainly that it was, as Bert had said, “up to them” to do the best they could under the circumstances, and this they proceeded to do without further loss of time.
“The first thing to do,” said Bert, “is to scout around and see if we can find the place where the savages left the clearing with their prisoner. Then it will be our own fault if we cannot follow the trail.”
This seemed more easily said than done, however, and it was some time before the three, frettingand impatient at the delay, were able to find any clue. At last Bert gave an exultant whoop and beckoned the others over to where he stood.
“I’ll bet any amount of money this is where they entered the jungle,” he said, exultantly. “Their prisoner evidently evaded their observation while they were breaking a path through, and pinned this on the bush here,” and he held up a corner of a white linen handkerchief, with the initial M embroidered on the corner.
“Gee, I guess you’re right,” agreed Dick. “Things like that don’t usually grow on bushes. It ought to be easy for us to trace the party now.”
This proved to be far from the actual case, however, and if it had not been for the occasional scraps of clothing fluttering from a twig or bush every now and then their search would have probably ended in failure. So rank and luxuriant is the jungle growth in tropical climates, that although in all probability a considerable body of men had passed that way only a few days before, practically all trace of their progress was gone. The thick underbrush grew as densely as ever, and it would have seemed to one not skilled in woodland arts that the foot of man had never trod there. Monkeys chattered in the trees as they went along, and parrots with rainbow plumage shot among the lofty branches, uttering raucous cries. Humming clouds of mosquitoes rose andgathered about their heads, and added to the heat to make their journey one of torment.
Their previous experience as campers now stood them in good stead, and they read without much trouble signs of the progress of the party in front of them that they must surely have missed otherwise.
After three hours of dogged plodding, in which few words were exchanged, Bert said, “I don’t think we can have very much further to go, fellows. I remember the captain saying that this island was not more than a few miles across in any direction, and we must have traveled some distance already. We’re bound to stumble on their camp soon, so we’d better be prepared.”
“Probably by this time,” said Tom, “the savages will have returned to the mainland, or some other island from which they came. I don’t think it very likely that they live permanently on this one. It seems too small.”
“Yes, I thought of that,” said Bert, “but we’ve got to take our chance on that. If they are gone, there is nothing else we can do, and we can say we did our best, anyway.”
“But what shall we do when we find them?” asked Tom, after a short pause, “provided, of course, that our birds haven’t flown.”
“Oh, we’ll have to see how matters stand, and make our plans accordingly,” replied Bert. “Youfellows had better make sure your revolvers are in perfect order. I have a hunch that we’ll need them before we get through with this business.”
Fortunately, before leaving the ship the boys had, at Bert’s suggestion, strapped on their revolvers, and each had slipped a handful of cartridges into their pockets.
“The chances are a hundred to one we won’t need them at all,” Bert had said at the time. “But if anythingshouldcome up where we’ll need them, we’ll probably be mighty glad we brought them.”
The boys were very thankful for this now, as without the trusty little weapons their adventure would have been sheer madness. As it was, however, the feel of the compact .45’s was very reassuring, and they felt that they would at least have a fighting chance, if worse came to worst, and they were forced to battle for their lives.
They advanced more cautiously now, with every sense alert to detect the first sign of any lurking savage. They had not proceeded far in this manner when Bert, who was slightly in the lead, motioned with his hand in back of him for them to stop. This they did, almost holding their breath the while, trying to make out what Bert had seen or heard. For several seconds he stood the very picture of attention and concentration, and then turned to them.
“What is it, Bert, do you see anything?” inquired Dick, in a subdued but tense whisper.
“Not a thing as yet,” answered Bert, in the same tone, “but I thought I smelled smoke, and if I did, there must be a camp-fire of some kind not very far away. Don’t you fellows smell it?”
Both sniffed the air, and as a slight breeze suddenly blew against their faces, Tom said, “Gee, Bert, I smell it now!”
“So do I!” said Dick, almost at the same instant, and the hearts of all three began to beat hard. They had evidently trailed the party of savages to their camp, and now they had somethingof the feeling of the lion hunter who suddenly comes unexpectedly upon his quarry and is not quite certain what to do with it when cornered. Needless to say, they had never faced any situation like this before, and it is not to be wondered at if they felt a little nervous over attempting to take a prisoner out from the midst of a savage camp, not even knowing what might be the force or numbers of the enemy they would have to cope with.
This feeling was but momentary, however, and almost immediately gave place to a fierce excitement and a wild exultation at the prospect of danger and conflict against odds. Each knew the others to be true and staunch to their heart’s core, and as much to be relied on as himself. They felt sure that at least they were capable of doing as much or more than anybody else under the circumstances, and so the blood pounded through their veins and their eyes sparkled and danced as they drew together to hold a “council of war.”
There was little to be discussed, however, as they all three felt that the only thing to do was to “face the music and see the thing through to the finish,” as Bert put it.
Accordingly they shook hands, and drew their revolvers, so as to be ready for any emergency at a moment’s notice. Then, with Bert once more in the lead, they took up their interrupted march.For all the noise they made, they might have been the savages themselves. Their early training in camp and field now proved invaluable, and not a twig cracked or a leaf rustled at their cautious approach. Soon a patch of light in front of them indicated a break in the jungle, and they crouched double as they advanced. Suddenly Bert made a quick motion with his hand, and darted like a streak into the underbrush at the side of the trail. The others did likewise, and not a moment too soon. A crackling of the undergrowth cluttering the path announced the approach of a considerable body of men, and in a few moments the boys, from their place of concealment, where they could look out from the leafy underbrush with little chance of being seen, saw a party of eight or ten dusky warriors pass by, apparently bent on foraging, for each carried a large bag slung over his shoulder.
They were big, splendidly built men, but their faces indicated a very low order of intelligence. Their features were large, coarse, and brutish, and the boys were conscious of a shudder passing over them as they thought of being at the mercy of such creatures.
The savages seemed in a good humor just then, however, for every once in a while they laughed among themselves, evidently at something humorous one of them was reciting. It was well for ourheroes that they were so, for otherwise they could hardly have failed to notice signs of their recent presence on the trail. Fortunately this did not happen, however, and soon they were swallowed up in the dense jungle.
Shortly afterward the boys emerged from their places of concealment, and resumed their slow advance. They were soon at the edge of the clearing, and then halted to reconnoitre before venturing further.
The savages were encamped in a natural hollow, and had apparently made arrangements for quite a protracted visit. They had constructed rude huts or lean-tos of branches and leaves, scattered at any place that seemed convenient. Naked children shouted noisily as they played and rolled on the green turf, and made such a noise that the parrots in the woods were frightened, and flew away with disgusted squawks.
In the center of the encampment were two huts evidently constructed with more care than the others, and around both were squatted sentries with javelins lying on the ground within easy reach.
“I’ll bet any money they are keeping their prisoner in one of those shacks, fellows,” said Bert, “but what do you suppose the other one is for? It looks bigger than the others.”
“Oh, that’s probably the king’s palace,” saidDick. “Compared to the rest of those hovels it almost looks like one, at that.”
“That’s what it is, all right,” agreed Tom, “but how are we going to tell which one is the prisoner’s, and which the king’s? We don’t want to go and rescue the wrong one, you know.”
“No danger of that,” said Bert. “All we’ve got to do is to lie low a little while and see what’s going on down there. We’ll find out how matters stand soon enough.”
Accordingly, the trio concealed themselves as best they could, and in whispers took council on the best means of bringing about the release of the captive.
This proved a knotty problem, however, and for a long while they seemed no nearer its solution. It was Bert who finally proposed the plan that they eventually followed.
“I think,” he said, “that we’d better get the lay of the land securely in our eye, and then wait till dark and make our attempt. We haven’t got any chance otherwise, as far as I can see. It would be nonsense to rush them in the broad light of day, for we’d simply be killed or captured ourselves, and that wouldn’t improve matters much. There will be a full moon, almost, to-night, and this clearing isn’t so big but what we might be able to sneak from the shadow of the trees up close to the two center huts. Then we could overpowerthe sentries, if we have luck, and smuggle the prisoner into the woods. Once there, we’ll have to take our chance of keeping them off with our revolvers, if they pursue and overtake us. Can either of you think of a better plan than that?”
It seemed that neither could, and so they resolved to carry out Bert’s. Accordingly, they kept their positions till the sun gradually sank, and the shadows began to creep over the little clearing. The night descended very quickly, however, as it always does in tropical latitudes, but it seemed an age to the impatient boys before the jungle was finally enshrouded in inky shadows, and it became time for them to make their desperate attempt. Stealthy rustlings and noises occasionally approached them as they lay, and more than once they thought their hiding-place had been discovered. At last, Bert decided that the time had come to put their plan into action, and they rose stealthily from their cramped position. The prospect of immediate action was like a strong stimulant to these three tried comrades, and all thought of danger and possible, nay, even probable, death, or what might be infinitely worse, capture, was banished from their minds. They had often craved adventure, and now they seemed in a fair way to get their fill of it.
Quietly as cats they stole around the edge ofthe clearing, planting each footstep with infinite care to avoid any possible sound. Once a loud shouting arose from the camp, and they made sure that they were discovered, and grasped their revolvers tightly, resolved to sell their lives dearly. It proved to be merely some disturbance among the savages, however, and they ventured to breathe again.
Foot by foot they skirted the clearing, guided by the fitful and flickering light of the camp-fire, and finally gained a position in what they judged was about the rear of the two central huts.
Now there was nothing to do but wait until the majority of the camp should fall asleep, and this proved the most trying ordeal they had yet experienced. At first groups of boisterous children approached their place of concealment, and more than once their hearts leapt into their mouths as it seemed inevitable that they would be discovered by them. As luck would have it, however, the children decided to return to the fire, and so they escaped at least one peril.
Gradually the noises of the camp diminished, and the fire flickered and burnt low. It was now the turn of the jungle insects, and they struck up a chorus that seemed deafening. Also, the mosquitoes issued forth in swarms, and drove the three boys almost frantic, for they did not dare to change their positions or make any effort toward off the humming pests, as the noise entailed in doing so would have been almost certain to betray them.
There is an end to the longest wait, however, and at Bert’s low whisper they crept toward the two huts they had marked in the center of the village. The moon was not yet high over the trees, and threw thick patches of inky blackness, that served our three adventurers well.
At times they could hardly make out each other’s forms, so deep were the shadows, and they breathed a prayer of thankfulness for this aid.
The shadows fell at least ten feet short of the huts, however, and across this open space it was evident they would have to dash and take their chances of being seen.
As they had watched from the woods earlier in the evening, they had seen that the guard around the huts consisted of two men for each. The huts were perhaps forty feet apart, and this made it possible for them to attack the sentries guarding the one in which the prisoner was confined without necessarily giving the alarm to those about the other shack.
The boys were near enough to the dusky sentries now to hear their voices as they exchanged an occasional guttural remark. Bert touched the other two lightly, and they stopped. “I’ll takethe fellow nearest the fire,” he breathed, “you two land on the other one. Club him with your revolvers, but whatever you do, don’t let him make a sound, or we’re gone for sure. Understand?”
“Sure,” they whispered, and all prepared to do their parts. At a whispered word from Bert, they dashed with lightning speed across the patch of moonlight, and before the astonished sentries could utter a cry were upon them like so many whirlwinds. Bert grasped the man he had selected by the throat, and dealt him a stunning blow on the head with the butt of his revolver. The blow would have crushed the skull of any white man, but it seemed hardly to stun the thickheaded savage. He wriggled and squirmed, and Bert felt his arm go back toward the sash round his waist, feeling for the wicked knife that these savages always wore.
Bert dared not let go of his opponent’s throat, as he knew that one cry would probably ring their death knell. He retained his grasp on his enemy’s windpipe, therefore, but dropped his revolver and grasped the fellow’s wrist. They wrestled and swayed, writhing this way and that, but fortunately the soft moss and turf under them deadened the sound of their struggles.
Bert had met his match that night, however, and, strain as he might, he felt his opponent’shand creeping nearer and nearer the deadly knife. He realized that his strength could not long withstand the terrific strain put upon it, and he resolved to make one last effort to beat the savage at his own game. Releasing the fellow’s sinewy wrist, he made a lightning-like grasp for the hilt of the knife, and his fingers closed over it a fraction of a second ahead of those of the black man. Eluding the latter’s frantic grasp at his wrist, he plunged the keen and heavy knife into the shoulder of his opponent. Something thick and warm gushed over his hand, and he felt the muscles of his enemy go weak. Whether dead or unconscious only, he was for the time being harmless. Bert himself was so exhausted that for a few moments he lay stretched at full length on the earth, unable to move or think.
In a few moments his strong vitality asserted itself, however, and he gathered strength enough to go to the assistance of his comrades. It was not needed, though, for they had already choked the remaining guard into unconsciousness.
They waited a few moments breathlessly, to see if the noise, little as it had been, had aroused the rest of the camp. Apparently it had not, and they resolved to enter the hut without further loss of time.
This was accomplished with little difficulty, and they were soon standing in the interior of theshack, which was black as any cave. The boys had feared that there would be another guard in the place, who might give the alarm before he could be overpowered, but they now saw that this fear had been groundless.
A torch, stuck in a chink in the wall, smoked and flared, and by its uncertain light they could make out the form of a man bound securely to one of the corner posts. He gazed at them without saying a word, and seemed unable to believe the evidence of his senses.
“What—what—how—” he stammered, but Bert cut him short.
“Never mind talking now, old man,” he said. “It’s a long story, and we’d better not wait to talk now. We’re here, but it remains to be seen if we ever get away, or become candidates for a cannibal feast ourselves.”
“How did you get past the sentries?” asked the prisoner.
“Well, we didn’t wait to get their consent, you can bet on that,” returned Bert, “and I don’t think, now that wearehere, that they’ll offer any objections to our leaving, either. But now, it’s up to us to get you untied, and make a quick sneak. Somebody’s liable to come snooping around here almost any time, I suppose.”
“You may be sure we can’t leave any too soon to suit me,” said the captive. “I believe, fromall that I have been able to gather from their actions, that I was to furnish the material for a meal for the tribe to-morrow. They’re head hunters and cannibals, and the more space I put between them and me the better I shall be pleased.”
While he had been speaking, the boys had been busily engaged in cutting the cords that bound him, and now they assisted him to his feet. He had been bound in one position so long, however, that he could hardly stand at first, and Bert began to fear that he would not be able to move. After a few moments, however, his powers began to come back to him, and in a few minutes he seemed able to walk.
“All right, fellows, I guess we won’t wait to pay our respects to the king,” said Bert. “Let’s get started. Do you feel able to make a dash now?” he inquired, addressing the erstwhile prisoner.
The latter signified that he was, and they prepared to leave without further discussion. When they got outside, they found that they were favored by a great piece of good fortune. The moon was now in such a position that it threw the shadow of a particularly tall tree almost to the hut, and they quickly made for the welcome security it offered. They made as little noise as possible, but their companion was less expert in the ways of the woods than they, and more than onceslipped and fell, making a disturbance that the boys felt sure would be heard by someone in the camp.
Fate was kind to them, however, and at last they reached the shelter of the woods without apparently having given the savages any cause for suspicion. Once well in the jungle, they felt justified in making more speed without bothering so much about the noise. After a little trouble they found the trail that they had followed to the camp, and started back toward the coast with the best speed they could muster.
In the dense shadows cast by the arching trees they could hardly see a foot ahead of them, and continually stumbled, tripped, and fell over the roots and creepers in their path.
Their progress became like a horrible nightmare, in which one is unable to make any headway in fleeing from a pursuing danger, no matter how hard one tries. They were haunted by the fear of hearing the yell of the savages in pursuit, for they knew that if they were overtaken, here in the narrow path, in pitch darkness, they would be slaughtered by an unseen enemy without the chance to fight. The experienced savages could come at them from all sides through the forest, and have them at a terrible disadvantage.
“If we can only make that rocky little hill we passed coming to this infernal place, fellows,”panted Bert, “we can stay there till daylight, and at least make a fight for our lives. If they should catch us here now, they could butcher us like rats in a trap.”
In compliance with these words, they made desperate efforts to hurry their pace, and were beginning to pluck up hope. Suddenly their hearts stood still, and then began to beat furiously.
Far behind them in the mysterious, deadly jungle, they heard a weird, eerie shrill cry.
“What was it? What was it?” whispered Tom, in a low, horror-struck voice.
The man whom they had freed made one or two efforts to speak, but his words refused to come at first. Then he said, in a dry, hard voice, “I know what it is. That was the cry their hunting wolves give when they are on the trail of their quarry. May heaven help us now, for we are dead men.”
“Hunting wolves?” said Bert, in a strained voice, “what do you mean?”
“They’re three big wolves the savages captured at some time, and they have trained them to help run down game in the hunt, the same as we have trained dogs. Only these brutes are far worse than any dog, and a thousand times more savage. If they get us—” but here his voice trailed down into silence, for again they heard that fierce cry, but this time much nearer.
The little party broke into a desperate run, and blundered blindly, frantically forward. The mysterious, danger-breathing jungle surrounding them on every side, the horrible pursuit closing in on them from behind, caused their hair to rise with an awful terror that lent wings to their feet. They stumbled, fell, picked themselves and each other up again, and hastened madly forward in their wild race.
“If we can only make it, if we can only make it,” Bert repeated over and over to himself, while the breath came in great sobbing gasps from between his lips. He was thinking of their one last chance of safety—the little knoll that he had marked as they followed the savages’ trail the previous day as a possible retreat if they were pursued.
Loud and weird came the baying of the beasts on their trail, but Bert, straining his eyes ahead, could make out a little patch of moonlight through the trees.
“Faster, fellows, faster,” he gasped. “A little further, and we’ll be there. Faster, faster!”
With a last despairing effort they dashed into the clearing, which was flooded with silvery moonlight. Now, at least, they would be able to see and fight, and their natural courage came back to them.
“Get up on that big rock in the center!” yelledBert, “for your lives, do you hear me? for your lives!”
They scrambled madly up the huge boulder, Bert helping them and being pulled up last by Dick and Tom. Dropping on the flat top of the rock, perhaps seven or eight feet from the ground, they drew their revolvers and faced toward the opening in the trees from which they had dashed a few moments before.
Nor had they long to wait. From the jungle rushed three huge wolves, forming such a spectacle as none of the little party ever forgot to his dying day. The hair bristled on their necks and backs, and foam dropped from their jaws. As they broke from the line of trees they gave utterance once more to their blood-curdling bay, but then caught sight of the men grouped on the big boulder, and in terrible silence made straight for them.
Without stopping they made a leap up the steep sides of the rock. Almost at the same instant the three revolvers barked viciously, and one big brute dropped back, biting horribly at his ribs, and then running around the little glade in circles. The other two scrambled madly at the rock, trying to get a foothold, and one grasped Dick’s shoe in his teeth. A second later, however, and before his jaws even had a chance to close, the three guns spoke at once, and the animaldropped quivering back upon the ground. The third beast seemed somewhat daunted by the fate of his comrades, and was moreover wounded slightly himself. He dropped back and took up a position about ten feet from the boys’ place of refuge, and throwing back his head, gave utterance to a dismal howl. Faintly, as though answering him, the boys heard a yell, that they knew could be caused by none but the savages themselves.
It seemed hopeless to fight against such odds, but these young fellows were not made of the stuff that gives up easily. Where the spirit of others might have sunk under such repeated trials, theirs only became more stubborn and more determined to overcome the heavy odds fate had meted out to them.
Taking careful aim Bert fired at the remaining wolf, and his bullet fulfilled its mission. The brute dropped without a quiver, and Bert slid to the ground.
“Come on, fellows,” he yelled, “get busy here and help me build a fort. We’ve got to roll some of these rocks into position in a little less than no time, so we can give them an argument when they arrive.”
“Oh, what’s the use?” said the man whom they had rescued, in a hopeless voice. “We haven’t got any chance against them. We mightas well surrender first as last, and take our chances of escaping afterward.”
“Why, man, what are you talking about?” said Dick, scornfully. “You don’t think we’re going to give in without a struggle, do you, when we have some shelter here and guns in our hands? Not on your life, we won’t, and don’t you forget it.”
“Well, I was just giving you my opinion, that’s all,” said the man, who, it must be confessed, spoke in a rather shamefaced manner. “We’re sure to be butchered if we follow out your plan, though, mark my words.”
“Well, we’ll at least send some of them to their last accounting before they do get to us,” said Bert. “Step lively, now, and help us, instead of talking in that fool way.”
While this talk had been going on the boys had rolled several big boulders up against the one that had already offered them such timely aid, in such a manner as to form a little enclosed space or fort. In their excitement and pressing need they accomplished feats of strength that under ordinary circumstances they would not even have attempted or believed possible.
Soon they had made every preparation they could think of, and with set teeth and a resolve to fight to the last gasp waited the coming of the pursuing cannibals.
Soon they could hear them rushing through the forest, exchanging deep-throated cries, and a few moments later they burst into the clearing. When they saw the preparations that had been made for their reception, however, they paused, and some pointed excitedly toward the three dead wolves. It was evident that they had been more prepared to see the mangled bodies of their erstwhile prisoner and his rescuers, rather than what they actually did find.
Bert, seeing that they were disconcerted, decided to open hostilities. With a wild yell, he started firing his revolver toward the closely-grouped savages, taking careful aim with each shot. A much poorer shot than Bert would have had difficulty in missing such a mark, and every bullet took deadly effect.
All at once panic seemed to seize on the savages, and they rushed madly back into the jungle. Of course, Bert wasted no more valuable ammunition firing at an unseen enemy, and a breathless hush fell over the scene.
At first the little party expected the savages to renew the conflict, but the time wore slowly on and nothing of the kind happened. They kept a keen lookout to guard against a surprise, but none was attempted.
At length dawn broke, and the sun had never been so welcome to the boys as it was then.In the light of day their experience seemed like an awful dream, or would have seemed so, had it not been for the bodies of the three wolves.
The besieged party held a “pow-wow,” and as it was clear that they could not stay where they were indefinitely, they decided to make a break for the ship without further delay.
After a careful reconnoitering of the path, they ventured into it with many misgivings, but could see no sign of the head hunters. They made the best possible speed, and it was not very long before they reached the beach.
Needless to say, the whole ship’s company had been greatly worried over their absence, but their relief was correspondingly great at their safe return. The captain had reinforced Mr. Miller’s complement of men with orders to go in search of the three boys as soon as morning broke. He was prepared to hold them strictly to account for what he thought their rashness, but repressed his censure when he heard their story. The boat was swung inboard, theFearlessgathered way, and the island receding to a point was soon lost to sight in the distance.
“Better fifty years of EuropeThan a cycle of Cathay,”
“Better fifty years of EuropeThan a cycle of Cathay,”
murmured Dick, yielding once more to his chronic habit of quotation.
They had reached the gateway of Southern China and cast anchor in the harbor of Hong-Kong. It had been a day of great bustle and confusion, and all hands had been kept busy from the time the anchor chain rattled in the hawse-hole until dusk began to creep over the waters of the bay. The great cranes had groaned with their loads as they swung up the bales and boxes from the hold and transferred them to the lighters that swarmed about the sides of theFearless. The passengers, eager once more to be onterra firmaafter the long voyage, had gone ashore, and the boat was left to the officers and crew. These had been kept on board by the manifold duties pertaining to their position, but were eagerly looking forward to the morrow, when the covetedshore leave would be granted in relays to the crew, while the officers would be free to go and come almost as they pleased. It was figured that even with the greatest expedition in discharging cargo and taking on the return shipments for the “States,” it would be nearly or quite a week before they began their return journey, and they promised themselves in that interval to make the most of their stay in this capital of the Oriental commercial world.
Now, as dusk fell over the waters, the boys sat at the rail and gazed eagerly at the strange sights that surrounded them. The harbor was full of shipping gathered from the four quarters of the world. On every side great liners lay, ablaze with light from every cabin and porthole. Native junks darted about saucily here and there, while queer yellow faces looked up at them from behind the mats and lateen-rigged sails. The unforgettable smells of an Eastern harbor assailed their nostrils. The high pitched nasal chatter of the boatmen wrangling or jesting, was unlike anything they had ever before heard or imagined. Everything was so radically different from all their previous experiences that it seemed as though they must have kneeled on the magic carpet of Solomon and been transported bodily to a new world.
Before them lay the city itself glowing withmyriad lights. The British concession with its splendid buildings, its immense official residences, its broad boulevards, might have been a typical European city set down in these strange Oriental surroundings. But around and beyond this lay the real China, almost as much untouched and uninfluenced by these modern developments as it had been for centuries. Great hills surrounded the city on every side, and temples and pagodas uprearing their quaint sloping roofs indicated the location of the original native quarters. In the distance they could see the lights of the little cable railway that carried passengers to the heights from which they could obtain a magnificent view of the harbor and the surrounding country.
The ship’s doctor had come up just as Dick had finished his quotation.
“Yes,” he assented, as he lit a fresh cigar and drew his chair into the center of the group. “The poet might have gone further than that and intimated that even one year of Europe would be better than a ‘cycle of Cathay.’ There’s more progress ordinarily in a single year among Europeans than there is here in twenty centuries.”
They gladly made room for him. The doctor was a general favorite and a cosmopolitan in all that that word implies. He seemed to have been everywhere and seen everything. In the courseof his profession he had been all over the world, and knew it in every nook and corner. He had a wealth of interesting experiences, and had the gift of telling them, when in congenial company, in so vivid and graphic a way, that it made the hearer feel as though he himself had taken part in the events narrated.
“Of course,” went on the doctor, “it all depends on the point of view. If progress is a good thing, we have the advantage of the Chinese. If it is a bad thing, they have the advantage of us. Now, they say it is a bad thing. With them ‘whatever is is right.’ Tradition is everything. What was good enough for their parents is good enough for them. They live entirely in the past. They cultivate the ground in the same way and with the same implements that their fathers did two thousand years ago. To change is to offend the gods. All modern inventions are devices of the devil. Every event in their whole existence is governed by cut and dried rules. From the moment of birth to that of death, life moves along one fixed groove. They don’t want railroads or telephones or phonographs or machinery or anything else that to us seems a necessity of life. Whatever they have of these has been forced upon them by foreigners. A little while ago they bought up a small railroad that the French had built, paid a big advance on the original price, andthen threw rails and locomotives into the sea.”
“Even our ‘high finance’ railroad wreckers in Wall Street wouldn’t go quite as far as that,” laughed Tom.
“No,” smiled the doctor, “they’d do it just as effectively, but in a different way.”
“And yet,” interposed Dick, “the Chinese don’t seem to me to be a stupid race. We had one or two in our College and they were just as bright as anyone there.”
“They’re not stupid by any means,” replied the doctor. “There was a time, thousands of years ago, when they were the very leaders of civilization. They had their inventors and their experimenters. Why, they found out all about gunpowder and printing and the mariner’s compass, when Europe was sunk in the lowest depths of ignorance. At that time, the intellect of the people was active and productive. But then they seem to have had a stroke of paralysis, and they’ve never gotten over it.”
“It always seemed to me,” said Bert, “that ‘Alice in Wonderland’ should really have been called ‘Alice in China-land.’ She and her mad hatter and the March hare and the Cheshire cat would certainly have felt at home here.”
“True enough,” rejoined the doctor. “It isn’t without reason that this has been called ‘Topsy-turvy’ land.”
“For instance,” he went on, “you could never get into a Chinaman’s head what Shakespeare meant when he said: ‘A rose by any other name would smell as sweet.’ The roses in China have no fragrance.
“Take some other illustrations. When we give a banquet, the guest of honor is seated at the right of the host as a special mark of distinction. In China, he is placed at the left. If you meet a friend in the street, out goes your hand in greeting. The Chinaman shakes hands with himself. If an American or European is perplexed about anything he scratches his head. When the Chinaman is puzzled, he scratches his foot.”
The comicality of this idea was too much for the gravity of the boys—never very hard to upset at any time—and they roared with laughter. Their laugh was echoed more moderately by Captain Manning, who, relieved at last of the many duties attendant upon the first day in port, had come up behind them and now joined the group. The necessity of keeping up the strain and dignity of his official position had largely disappeared with the casting of the anchor, and it was more with the easy democracy and good fellowship of the ordinary passenger that he joined in the conversation.
“They have another queer custom in China that bears right on the doctor’s profession,” hesaid, with a sly twinkle in his eye. “Here they employ a doctor by the year, but they only pay him as long as the employer keeps well. The minute he gets sick, the doctor’s salary ceases, and he has to work like sixty to get him well in a hurry, so that his pay may be resumed.”
“Well,” retorted the doctor, “I don’t know but they have the better of us there. It is certainly an incentive to get the patient well at once, instead of spinning out the case for the sake of a bigger fee. I know a lot of fashionable doctors whose income would go down amazingly if that system were introduced in America.”
“You’ll find, too,” said the captain, “that the Chinaman’s idea of what is good to eat is almost as different from ours as their other conceptions. There’s just about one thing in which they agree with us, and that is on the question of pork. They are very fond of this, and you have all read, no doubt, the story told by Charles Lamb of the Chinese peasant whose cabin was burned, together with a pig who had shared it with the family. His despair at the loss of the pig was soon turned to rejoicing when he smelled the savory odor of roast pork and learned for the first time how good it was. But, outside of that, we don’t have much in common. They care very little for beef or mutton. To make up for this, however, they have made a good many discoveries in the culinary linethat they regard as delicacies, but that you won’t find in any American cook book. Rats and mice and edible birds’ nests and shark fins are served in a great variety of ways, and those foreigners who have had the courage to wade through the whole Chinese bill of fare say it is surprising to find out how good it is. After all, you can get used to anything, and we Europeans and Americans are becoming broader in our tastes than we used to be. Horse meat is almost as common as beef in Berlin; dogs are not disdained in some parts of France, and only the other day I read of a banquet in Paris where they served stuffed angleworms and pronounced them good.”
“I imagine it will be a good while, however, before we get to the point where rats and mice are served in our restaurants,” said Tom, with a grimace.
“Yes,” rejoined the captain, “we’ll probably draw the line there and never step over it. But you’ll have a chance pretty soon to sample Chinese cooking, and if you ask no questions and eat what is set before you, you will probably find it surprisingly good. ‘What the eye doesn’t see the heart doesn’t grieve over,’ you know. And when you come to the desserts, you will find that there are no finer sweetmeats in the world than those served at Chinese tables.”
“Another thing that seems queer to us Westernpeople,” said the doctor, “is their idea of the seat of intellect. We regard it as the head. They place it in the stomach. If the Chinaman gets off what he thinks to be a witty thing, he pats his stomach in approval.”
“I suppose when his head is cut off, he still goes on thinking,” grinned Tom.
“That wouldn’t phase a Chinaman for a minute,” answered the doctor. “He’d retort by asking you if you’d go on thinking if they cut you in half.”
“Then, if you wanted to praise a Chinese author, I suppose, instead of alluding to his ‘bulging brow,’ it would be good form to refer to his ‘bulging stomach,’” laughed Ralph.
“Gee,” put in Tom, “if that were so, I’ve seen some fat people in the side shows at the circus that would have it all over Socrates.”
“There’s one thing,” went on the doctor, “where they set us an example that we well might follow, and that is in the tolerance they have for the religious views of other people. There isn’t any such thing as persecution or ostracism in China on the score of religious belief. There are three or four religions and all are viewed with approval and kindly toleration. A man, for instance, will meet several strangers in the course of business or of travel, and they will fall into conversation. It is etiquette to ask the religiousbelief of your new acquaintances, so our Chinaman asks the first of them: ‘Of what religion are you?’ ‘I practice the maxims of Confucius,’ is the response. ‘Very good, and you?’ turning to the second. ‘I am a follower of Lao-tze.’ The third answers that he is a Buddhist, and the first speaker winds up the conversation on this point by shaking hands—with himself—and genially remarking: ‘Ah, well, we are all brothers after all.’”
“They certainly have the edge on us there,” remarked Bert. “I wish we had a little of that spirit in our own country. We could stand a lot more of it than we have.”
“Outside of the question of religion, however,” went on the doctor, “we might think that they carry politeness too far to suit our mode of thinking. If you should meet a friend and ask after the health of his family, you would be expected to say something like this: ‘And how is your brilliant and distinguished son, the light of your eyes and future hope of your house, getting on?’ To this your friend would probably reply: ‘That low blackguard and detestable dog that for my sorrow is called my son is in good health, but does not deserve that your glorious highness should deign to ask about him.’”
“You will notice,” said the captain when the laugh had subsided, “that the doctor uses the sonas an illustration. The poor daughter wouldn’t even be inquired about. She is regarded as her father’s secret sorrow, inflicted upon him by a malignant decree of fate. In a commercial sense, the boy is an asset; the girl is a liability. You hear it said sometimes, with more or less conviction, that the world we live in is a ‘man’s world.’ However that may be modified or denied elsewhere, it is the absolute truth as regards China. If the scale of a nation’s civilization is measured by the way it treats its women,—and I believe this to be true,—then the Celestial Kingdom ranks among the very lowest. From the time she comes, unwelcomed, into the world, until, unmourned, she leaves it, her life is not worth living. She is the slave of the household, and, in the field, she pulls the plough while the man holds the handles. In marriage, she is disposed of without the slightest reference to her own wishes, but wholly at the whim of her parents, and often sees the bridegroom’s face for the first time when he comes to take her to his own house. There she is as much a slave as before. Her husband can divorce her for the most flimsy reasons and she has no redress. No, it isn’t ‘peaches and cream’ to be a woman in China.”
“It doesn’t seem exactly a paradise of suffragettes,” murmured Ralph.
“No,” interjected Tom, “the Governmenthere doesn’t have to concern itself about ‘hunger strikes’ or ‘forcible feeding.’”
“To atone to some extent for this hateful feature of family life,” said the doctor, “they have another that is altogether admirable, and that is the respect shown to parents. In no country of the world is filial reverence so fully displayed as here. A disobedient son is almost unthinkable, and a murderer would scarcely be regarded with more disapproval. From birth to old age, the son looks upon his father with humility and reverence, and worships him as a god after he is dead. There is nothing of the flippancy with which we are too familiar in our own country. With us the ‘child is father of the man,’ or, if he isn’t, he wants to be. Here the man always remains the father of the child.”
“Yes,” said Bert, “I remember in Bill Nye’s story of his early life he says that at the age of four ‘he took his parents by the hand and led them out to Colorado.’”
“And that’s no joke,” put in the captain. “All the foreigners that visit our country are struck by the independent attitude of children to their parents.”
“Another thing we have to place to the credit of this remarkable people,” he went on, “is their love for education. The scholar is held in universal esteem. The road to learning is also the road to the highest honors of the State. Every positionis filled by competitive examinations, and the one who has the highest mark gets the place. Of course their idea of education is far removed from ours. There is no attempt to develop the power of original thinking, but simply to become familiar with the teaching and wisdom of the past. Still, with all its defects, it stands for the highest that the nation knows, and they crown with laurels the men who rise to the front rank. Of course they wouldn’t compare for a moment with the great scholars of the Western world. Still, you know, ‘in a nation of the blind, the one-eyed man is king,’ and their scholars stand out head and shoulders above the general level, and are reverenced accordingly.”
“I suppose that system of theirs explains why the civil service in our own country is slightingly referred to as the ‘Chinese’ civil service by disgruntled politicians,” said Ralph.
“Yes,” said the captain, “and speaking of politicians, our Chinese friends could give us cards and spades and beat us out at that game. They’re the smoothest and slickest set of grafters in the world. Why, the way they work it here would make our ward politicians turn green with envy. We’re only pikers compared with these fellows. Graft is universal all through China. It taints every phase of the national life. Justice is bought and sold like any commodity and with scarcely a trace of shame or concealment. The only concernthe mandarin has with the case brought before him is as to which side will make him the richest present. It is a case of the longest purse and little else. Then after a man has been sent to prison, the jailer must be paid to make his punishment as light as possible. If he is condemned to death, the executioner must be paid to do his work as painlessly and quickly as he can. At every turn and corner the grafter stands with his palm held out, and unless you grease it well you might as well abandon your cause at the start. You’re certainly foredoomed to failure.”
“Well,” said Bert, “we’re badly enough off at home in the matter of graft, but at least we have some ‘chance for our white alley’ when we go into a court of justice.”
“Yes,” assented the doctor, “of course a long purse doesn’t hurt there, as everywhere else. But, in the main, our judges are beyond the coarse temptation of money bribes. We’ve advanced a good deal from the time of Sir Francis Bacon, that ‘brightest, wisest,meanestof mankind,’ who not only accepted presents from suitors in cases brought before him, but had the nerve to write a pamphlet justifying the practice and claiming that it didn’t affect his judgment.”
“What do you think of the present revolution in China, doctor?” asked Dick. “Will it bring the people more into sympathy with our way of looking at things?”
He shook his head skeptically.
“No,” he answered, “to be frank I don’t. Between us and the Chinese there is a great gulf fixed, and I don’t believe it will ever be bridged. The Caucasian and Mongolian races are wholly out of sympathy. We look at everything from opposite sides of the shield. We can no more mix than oil and water.
“The white races made a mistake,” he went on and the boys detected in his voice a strain of sombre foreboding, “when they drew China out of its shell and forced it to come in contact with the modern world. It was a hermit nation and wanted to remain so. All it asked was to be let alone. It was a sleeping giant. Why did we wake him up unless we wanted to tempt fate and court destruction?
“Not only that, but the giant had forgotten how to fight. We’re teaching him how just as fast as we can, and even sending European officers to train and lead his armies. The giant’s club was rotten and wormeaten. In its place, we’re giving him Gatling guns and rifled artillery, the finest in the world. We have forgotten that Mongol armies have already overrun the world and that they may do it again. We’re like the fisherman in the ‘Arabian Nights’ who found a bottle on the shore and learned that it held a powerful genii. As long as he kept the bottle corked he was safe. But he was foolish enoughto take out the cork, and the genii, escaping, became as big as a mountain, and couldn’t be squeezed back into the bottle. We’ve pulled the cork that held the Chinese genii and we’ll never get him back again. Think of four hundred million people, a third of the population of the world, conscious of their strength, equipped with modern arms, trained in the latest tactics, able to live on practically nothing, moving over Europe like a swarm of devastating locusts! When some Chinese Napoleon—and he may be already born—finds such an army at his back—God help Europe!”
He spoke with feeling, and a silence fell upon them as they looked over the great city, and thought of the thousands of miles and countless millions of inhabitants that lay beyond. Did they hear in imagination the gathering of shadowy hosts, the tread of marching armies, and the distant thunder of artillery? Or did they dimly sense with that mysterious clairvoyance sometimes vouchsafed to men that in a few days they themselves would be at death grip with that invisible “yellow peril” and barely win out with their lives?
Dick shivered, though the night was warm.
“Come along, fellows,” he said, as the captain and doctor walked away. “Let’s go to bed.”
The next morning the boys were up bright and early, ready for their trip through the city.
“By George,” said Dick, “I have to pinch myself to realize that we’re really in China at last. Until a month ago I never dreamed of seeing it. As a matter of course I had hoped and expected to go to Europe and possibly take in Egypt. That seemed the regulation thing to do and it was the limit of my traveling ambition. But as regards Asia, I’ve never quite gotten over the feeling I had when I was a kid. Then I thought that if I dug a hole through the center of the earth I’d come to China, and, since they were on the under side of the world, I’d find the people walking around upside down.”
“Well,” laughed Bert, “they’re upside down, sure enough, mentally and morally, but physically they don’t seem to be having any rush of blood to the head.”
An electric launch was at hand, but they preferred to take one of the native sampans thatdarted in and out among the shipping looking for passengers. They hailed one and it came rapidly to the side.
“See those queer little eyes on each side of the bow,” said Tom. “I wonder what they’re for?”
“Why, so that the boat can see where it is going,” replied Dick. “You wouldn’t want it to go it blind and bump head first into the side, would you?”
“And this in a nation that invented the mariner’s compass,” groaned Tom. “How are the mighty fallen!”
“And even that points to the south in China, while everywhere else it points to the north. Can you beat it?” chimed in Ralph.
“Even their names are contradictions,” said Bert. “This place was originally called ‘Hiang-Kiang,’ ‘the place of sweet waters.’ But do you catch any whiff here that reminds you of ottar of roses or the perfume wafted from ‘Araby the blest?’”
“Well, not so you could notice it,” responded Ralph, as the awful smells of the waterside forced themselves on their unwilling nostrils.
They speedily reached the shore and handed double fare to the parchment-faced boatman, who chattered volubly.
“What do you suppose he’s saying?” asked Tom.
“Heaven knows,” returned Ralph; “thanking us, probably. And yet he may be cursing us as ‘foreign devils,’ and consigning us to perdition. That’s one of the advantages of speaking in the toughest language on earth for an outsider to master.”
“It is fierce, isn’t it?” assented Bert. “I’ve heard that it takes about seven years of the hardest kind of study to learn to speak or read it, and even then you can’t do it any too well. Some simply can’t learn it at all.”
“Well,” said Tom, “I can’t conceive of any worse punishment than to have to listen to it, let alone speak it. Good old United States for mine.”
At the outset they found themselves in the English quarter. It was a splendid section of the city, with handsome buildings and well-kept streets, and giving eloquent testimony to the colonizing genius of the British empire. Here England had entrenched herself firmly, and from this as a point of departure, her long arm stretched out to the farthest limits of the Celestial Kingdom. She had made the place a modern Gibraltar, dominating the waters of the East as its older prototype held sway over the Mediterranean. Everywhere there were evidences of the law and order and regulated liberty that always accompany the Union Jack, and that explains why a little islandin the Western Ocean rules a larger part of the earth’s surface than any other power.
“We’ve certainly got to hand it to the English,” said Ralph. “They’re the worst hated nation in Europe, and yet as colonizers the whole world has to take off its hat to them. Look at Egypt and India and Canada and Australia and a score of smaller places. No wonder that Webster was impressed by it when he spoke of the ‘drum-beat that, following the sun and keeping pace with the hours, encircled the globe with the martial airs of England.’”
“It’s queer, too, why it is so,” mused Bert. “If they were specially genial and adaptable, you could understand it. But, as a rule, they’re cold and arrogant and distant, and they don’t even try to get in touch with the people they rule. Now the French are far more sympathetic and flexible, but, although they have done pretty well in Algiers and Tonquin and Madagascar, they don’t compare with the British as colonizers.”
“Well,” rejoined Ralph, “I suppose the real explanation lies in their tenacity and their sense of justice. They may be hard but they are just, and the people after a while realize that their right to life and property will be protected, and that in their courts the poor have almost an equal chance with the rich. But when all’s said and done, I guess we’ll simply have to say that theyhave the genius for colonizing and let it go at that.”
“Speaking of justice and fair play, though,” said Bert, “there’s one big blot on their record, and that is the way they have forced the opium traffic on China. The Chinese as a rule are a temperate race, but there seems to be some deadly attraction for them in opium that they can’t resist. It is to them what ‘firewater’ is to the Indian. The rulers of China realized how it was destroying the nation and tried to prohibit its importation. But England saw a great source of revenue threatened by this reform, as most of the opium comes from the poppy grown in India. So up she comes with her gunboats, this Christian nation, and fairly forces the reluctant rulers to let in the opium under threat of bombardment if they refused. To-day the habit has grown to enormous proportions. It is the curse of China, and the blame for the debauchery of a whole nation lies directly at the door of England and no one else.”
By this time they had passed through the British section and found themselves in the native quarter. Here at last they were face to face with the real China. They had practically been in Europe; a moment later and they were in Asia. A new world lay before them.
The streets were very narrow, sometimes notmore than eight or ten feet in width. A man standing at a window on one side could leap into one directly opposite. They were winding as well as narrow, and crowded on both sides with tiny shops in which merchants sat beside their wares or artisans plied their trade. Before each shop was a little altar dedicated to the god of wealth, a frank admission that here, as in America, they all worshipped the “Almighty Dollar.” Flaunting signs, on which were traced dragons and other fearsome and impossible beasts, hung over the store entrances.
“My,” said Ralph, “this would be a bad place for a heavy drinker to find himself in suddenly. He’d think he ‘had ’em’ sure. Pink giraffes and blue elephants wouldn’t be a circumstance to some of these works of art.”
“Right you are,” assented Tom. “I’ll bet if the truth were known the Futurist and Cubist painters, that are making such a splurge in America just now, got their first tips from just such awful specimens as these.”
“Well, these narrow streets have one advantage over Fifth Avenue,” said Ralph. “No automobile can come along here and propel you into another world.”
“No,” laughed Bert, “if the ‘Gray Ghost’ tried to get through here, it would carry away part of the houses on each side of the street. Theworst thing that can run over us here is a wheelbarrow.”
“Or a sedan chair,” added Tom, as one of these, bearing a passenger, carried by four stalwart coolies, brushed against him.
A constant din filled the air as customers bargained with the shop-keepers over the really beautiful wares displayed on every hand. Rare silks and ivories and lacquered objects were heaped in rich profusion in the front of the narrow stalls, and their evident value stood out in marked contrast to the squalid surroundings that served as a setting.
“No ‘one price’ here, I imagine,” said Ralph, as the boys watched the noisy disputes between buyer and seller.
“No,” said Bert. “To use a phrase that our financiers in America are fond of, they put on ‘all that the traffic will bear.’ I suppose if you actually gave them what they first asked they’d throw a fit or drop dead. I’d hate to take the chance.”
“It would be an awful loss, wouldn’t it?” asked Tom sarcastically, as he looked about at the immense crowd swarming like bees from a hive. “Where could they find anyone to take his place?”
“There are quite a few, aren’t there?” said Ralph. “The mystery is where they all live andsleep. There don’t seem to be enough houses in the town to take care of them all.”
“No,” remarked Bert, “but what the town lacks in the way of accommodations is supplied by the river. Millions of the Chinese live in the boats along the rivers, and at night you can see them pouring down to the waterside in droves. A white man needs a space six feet by two when he’s dead, but a Chinaman doesn’t need much more than that while he is alive. A sardine has nothing on him when it comes to saving space and packing close.”
At every turn their eyes were greeted with something new and strange. Here a wandering barber squatted in the street and carried on his trade as calmly as though in a shop of his own. Tinkers mended pans, soothsayers told fortunes, jugglers and acrobats held forth to delighted crowds, snake charmers put their slimy pets through a bewildering variety of exhibitions. Groups of idlers played fan-tan and other games of chance, and through the waving curtains of queerly painted booths came at times the acrid fumes of opium. Mingled with these were the odors of cooking, some repellant and some appetizing, which latter reminded the boys that it was getting toward noon and their healthy appetites began to assert themselves. They looked at each other.