are of the sound of lowing cattle, and presently, as their eyes
adjusted themselves to the sudden change in the light conditions, they
recognised that they were on the outskirts, so to speak, of a native
village, and that the inhabitants, whose quick eyes had detected their
presence upon the instant of their emergence from the forest, were
already mustering, with spear and shield, in unquestionably menacing
fashion.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN.

A FOREST ADVENTURE.

"Natives, and savages at that," remarked Lethbridge, taking in the
situation in an instant. "Now, you fellows," he continued, "our game is
to show a bold front, and to get well into the open straight away, so
that none of our black friends yonder can slip round, under cover of the
forest, and take us at close quarters in the rear. Those chaps may be
perfectly harmless and peaceable, but I confess they don't look it, and
it is a wise thing to be prepared for the worst. And now, Professor,
here is an opportunity for you to come out strong; you are acquainted
with no end of these African lingos, are you not? Better lose no time
in conveying to their intelligences the fact that we are friends, and
that if they are prepared to supply us with food, drink, and a shakedown
for the night, and to pilot us to the river to-morrow, we will
graciously refrain from annihilating them. But you will have to do it
quick, old chap, for it looks remarkably as though they were about to
make an uncommonly ugly demonstration against us."

It did, indeed. For, even while Lethbridge had been speaking, the
blacks had gathered, to the extent of some three or four hundred, each
armed with shield and spears, supplemented in many cases by heavy clubs
with big knotted heads thickly studded with formidable spikes, and were
now arranging themselves in a kind of crescent formation, as though to
attack and surround the four white men.

Von Schalckenberg walked up to and seized a small leafy branch
projecting low down from the trunk of a tree close at hand, and wrenched
it off. Then, raising this above his head, he boldly advanced toward
the threatening phalanx that was already moving forward.

"We must stick close to him," exclaimed Lethbridge, who by tacit consent
had assumed the direction of affairs in this crisis; "we must not allow
him to be cut off from us, or we shall never see him again."

The German boldly advanced, waving aloft his symbol of peace, and
shouting, in as many of