red; but they got the dose down, and smiled.

"Now," said Mr. Hume, "you both of you give me references to the
headmaster of your school, and I will give you one in return. I will
make inquiries about you, and I would advise you to make inquiries
about me. You can come back here to-morrow afternoon, and if we are
mutually satisfied, we will then fix up a contract."

"I don't think we require a reference," said Venning.

"Why not?" said Mr. Hume, sharply.

"Because," blurted out Venning, turning red--"because you have lived
among animals."

Mr. Hume laughed heartily with a deep rumbling laugh.

"Animals are tricky, boy; and yet," he added, "there may be a
meaning in what you say. They have a dignity in death that is grand.
Go and make your inquiries, lads. I am Dave Hume, the hunter, and my
life has been passed in wild lands, but there are some in London who
know me."

He rose up to open the door, and Venning overtopped him by inches,
yet he did not look either small or unwieldy. His step was springy,
and his head, poised on a massive neck, was well set, with the chin
raised. He was a man, evidently, who had always looked the world
straight in the face. His eyes had a yellowish tinge, and in their
colour and their calm they reminded Venning somehow of a lion, an
impression heightened by the tawny hue of a long beard.

The next day, the references having been satisfactorily followed up,
the contract was entered upon, and the two boys paid over the sum of
Pounds 50 each to David Hume, who in his turn agreed to let them
share in any profits which the expedition might make, from any
source whatever.

"Profits, Mr. Hume?" they asked.

"Profits from hunting, from trading, or from discovery. I don't say
that we shall make anything. The chances are, of course, that we may
lose all before we are a month out, but it is always well to be
business-like. There is gold in Central Africa. We may discover a
gold reef. There are new animals in the forest. We may catch an
okapi, and if we could land it in England it would fetch a large
sum. We might snare a live gorilla, and there is not a gorilla in
the zoological gardens of Europe."

"A gorilla!" said Venning, thinking of a picture he had seen of an
erect man-ape bending a rifle-barrel into an arch as if it were a
cane.

"A gorilla!" said Compton. "I should like to find the Garden of
Rest."

"You have heard his story, Mr. Venning?" said the hunter, nodding
his head at