rits
of all.

Chapter XXXVII.

COUNCIL FIRES IN TWO PLACES.

The rising sun flashed spears of light on a rocky spur that stretched
out from the foot of the mighty Andes. A tall, straight figure stood
silhouetted against a background of sun-bathed cliff. Higher above him
the great masses of land rolled back, league after league, and
stretched upwards foot after foot to the eternal snows and the eternal
heavens. Below him a belt of dark forest swept round the foothills of
the giant range, and through a gap in the mass of trees a noisy, turbid
stream went tumbling down to the sweltering plains and a feeder of the
Orinoco.

The man stood motionless as his rocky pedestal, and intently watching
something beyond the line of trees. Presently he turned sharply about,
came down from the crag, pushed his way through the trees, and stood in
a little pool-filled hollow. Almost immediately he was joined by about
twoscore men, all armed with spear and bow and arrow, and, like
himself, brown-skinned and stalwart. The newcomers bowed themselves to
the ground and murmured some words of homage and adulation. The
standing savage drew in a deep breath, expanding his broad chest, and
his eyes flashed with pride and power.

"Arise, my sons," he said; "the gods that make men and unmake them
shall reward you. Ye have been faithful to him whom the gods have set
over you. To the brave shall be the spoils; my sons shall lade
themselves with all their hearts may desire. Now tell me what you have
done."

A tall warrior stood forth. "We have followed our father since the
white strangers seized him. We have watched him and them, and waited
for this happy moment."

"Aught else?"

"We have spoken with the peoples who dwell in the woods and the hills,
and turned their minds against the men from the land of the sun-rising.
They will fight them if any man can discover a charm that will protect
them from the thunder and lightning that springs from the strangers'
hands."

The chieftain laughed. "I will find them a charm," he cried. "I have
walked all night," he added suddenly; "I will sleep. Watch ye."

The chieftain slept. One man went to the cliff as sentinel; the rest
squatted around the pool, looked to their weapons, and talked in
whispers. The sun climbed upwards, the shadows shortened, the water of
the pool grew warm, the sentinel ensconced himself in a shaded cleft of
the rock that overlooked the valley, and maint