starvation. They are a queer lot.

'Well,' continued young Middleton, whose pipe had gone out, and who was
fairly into his stride now, 'Well, Juggins and I were left alone, and
all that day we hunted through the jungle to try and get a shot at a
_seladang_,[14] but we saw nothing, and we came back to the empty Sakai
camp at night, my Malays fairly staggering under the weight of the
rubbish that Juggins used to call his botanical specimens. We got a meal
of sorts, and I was lying off smoking, and thinking how lucky it was
that the Sakai had cleared out, when suddenly old Juggins sat up with
his eyes fairly snapping at me.

[Footnote 14: _Seladang_ = wild buffalo.]

'"I say," he said, "I must have that baby. It would make a ripping
specimen."

'"It would make a ripping stink," I answered. "Go to sleep, Juggins, old
man, the tapioca has gone to your head."

'"No, but I am serious," said Juggins, "I mean to have that baby whether
you like it or no, and that is flat."

'"Yes," said I, "that is flat enough in all conscience, but I wish you
would give it up. People do not like having their dead tampered with."

'"No," said Juggins again, rising as he spoke, and reaching for his
shoes, "No, I am going to dig it up now."

'"Juggins," said I sharply, "sit down! You are a lunatic of course, but
I was another to bring you up here with me, knowing as I did the
particular species of crank you are; and if you really are set on this
beastly thing, I suppose I must not leave you in the lurch; though upon
my word I do _not_ like the notion of turning resurrection man in my old
age."

'"You are a brick!" cried Juggins, jumping up again and fumbling at his
boot laces, "Come along!"

'"Sit down, man!" said I in a tone which cooled his enthusiasm for the
moment. "I have said that I will see you through, and that is enough.
But mind this, you have to do what I tell you. I know more about the
people and the country than you do, and I am not going to lose caste
with my Malays, and perhaps get stranded in this god-forsaken
jumping-off place, just because you choose to do a fool's deed in a
fool's own way. These Malays of mine here have no particular love for
the exhumed bodies of dead babies, and they would not understand what
any sane man could want fooling about with such a thing. They have not
been educated up to that pitch of interest in the secrets of science
which seems to have made a lunatic of you. If they could understan