antly blue sky, with the sun, almost in the
zenith, darting his burning beams directly down upon my uncovered head
and my upturned face. Turning my head aside to escape the dazzling
brightness which smote upon my aching eyeballs with a sensation of
positive torture, I discovered that I was lying in about the centre of
an extensive forest clearing of nearly circular shape and about five
hundred yards in diameter, hemmed in on all sides by a dense growth of
jungle and forest trees, and carpeted thickly with short verdant grass.

Near me lay the apparently inanimate body of poor Mr Smellie, bound
hand and foot, like myself; and dotted about here and there on the
grass, mostly in a sitting posture and also bound, were some fifteen or
twenty negroes, who, from their wretched plight, I conjectured to be
survivors from the sunken slave schooner. Turning my head in the
opposite direction I discovered at a few yards distance a party of
negroes, some fifty in number, much finer-looking and more athletic men
than those in bonds round about me, who, from the weapons they bore, I
at once concluded to be our captors. This surmise was soon afterwards
proved to be correct; for, upon the completion of the meal which they
were busily discussing when I first made them out, they approached us,
and with sufficiently significant gestures gave us to understand that we
must rise and march.

The captive blacks rose to their feet stolidly and without any apparent
difficulty; but so far as I was concerned this was an impossibility, my
feet as well as my hands being secured. One great hulking black fellow,
noticing that neither Smellie nor I showed any signs of obedience,
deliberately proceeded to prod us here and there with the point of his
spear. Upon Smellie these delicate attentions produced no effect
whatever, he evidently being either dead or insensible; but they aroused
in me a very lively feeling of indignation, under the influence of which
I launched such a vigorous kick at the unreasonable darky's shins as
made him howl with pain and sent him hopping out of range in double-
quick time--a proceeding which raised a hearty laugh at his expense
among his companions. A moment later, however, he returned, his eyes
sparkling with rage, and would have transfixed me with the light javelin
he carried had not another of the party interfered. By the order of
this last individual Smellie and I were presently raised from the
ground, and each b