the remains of some unfortunate
flies, who had gone down into the treacherous vegetable cavern, and
being unable to clamber out had miserably perished.

During the heat of the day there was a halt once more, the Malays
staring at the sailors and soldiers sitting about under the trees for a
quiet smoke and watching the elephants, which, being relieved of their
pads and howdahs, walked straight into a great pool near to which they
were halted, and then cooled themselves by drawing their trunks full of
water and squirting it all over their sides.

"I'm blest," said one of the Jacks, "if they ain't the rummest beggars I
ever see. Just look at that one, Bill. Lor' if he ain't just like a
bit o' annymated hingy rubber."

"Ah?" said his mate, "you might fit a pair o' blacksmith's bellows on to
the muzzle o' that trunk of his, and then blow him out into a balloon."

"When are we going to begin to hunt tigers?" said another. "Oh, we
ain't going to hunt them at all, only keep 'em from coming by us, and
driving 'em up to where the orficers are."

"I say," said another sailor, "this here's all very well, but suppose
some time or another, when these Malay chaps have got us out into the
middle of these woods, they turn upon us, and whip out their krises--
what then?"

"What then?" said a soldier, who heard him; "why then we should have to
go through the bayonet exercise in real earnest; but it won't come to
that."

Two more days were spent in the journey, and then, upon his guests
beginning to manifest some impatience, the sultan announced that they
were now on the borders of the tiger country; and that afternoon there
were preparations for a beat when a couple of tigers were seen, but they
managed to escape.

The sultan smilingly told his guests that at the end of another march
the game would be more plentiful; and once more there was a steady tramp
along one of the narrow jungle-paths, into a country wilder than ever--
for they were away from the rivers now, and no traces of cultivation had
been seen.

There was no dissatisfaction, though, for if the officers shot no tigers
they found plenty of jungle-fowl and snipe, upon which they tried their
powers with the gun, and made goodly bags of delicious little birds to
add to the daily bill of fare.

Another day, and still another, in which the expedition penetrated
farther and farther into the forest wild. The officers were delighted,
and Doctor Bolter in raptures. He