kangaroo.

It was a matter of moments; the frightened animals, taking flying leaps
till out of sight, and Jimmy appeared, running up panting, to look
eagerly round.

"Whar a big wallaby?" he cried. "No shoot? No killum? Eh? Jimmy
killum one big small ole man!"

He trotted back as he spoke, and returned in triumph bearing one of the
creatures, about equal in size to a small lamb.

This was quickly dressed by the black, and secured hanging in a tree,
for the doctor would not listen to Jimmy's suggestion that we should
stop and "boil um in black fellow's pot all like muttons;" and then we
continued our climb till we had won to a magnificent position on the
shoulder of the mountain for making a careful inspection of the country
now seeming to lie stretched out at our feet.

A more glorious sight I never saw. Green everywhere, wave upon wave of
verdure lit up by the sunshine and darkening in shadow. Mountains were
in the distance, and sometimes we caught the glint of water; but sweep
the prospect as we would in every direction with the glass it was always
the same, and the doctor looked at me at last and shook his head.

"Joe," he said at last, "our plan appeared to be very good when we
proposed it, but it seems to me that we are going wrong. If we are to
find your father, whom we believe to be a prisoner--"

"Who is a prisoner!" I said emphatically.

"Why do you say that?" he cried sharply, searching me with his eyes.

"I don't know," I replied dreamily. "He's a prisoner somewhere."

"Then we must seek him among the villages of the blacks near the
sea-shore. The farther we go the more we seem to be making our way into
the desert. Look there!" he cried, pointing in different directions;
"the foot of man never treads there. These forests are impassable."

"Are you getting weary of our search, doctor?" I said bitterly.

He turned upon me an angry look, which changed to one of reproach.

"You should not have asked me that, my lad," he said softly. "You are
tired or you would not have spoken so bitterly. Wait and see. I only
want to direct our energies in the right way. The blacks could go on
tramping through the country; we whites must use our brains as well as
our legs."

"I--I beg your pardon, doctor!" I cried earnestly.

"All right, my lad," he said quietly. "Now for getting back to camp.
Where must our bearers be?"

He adjusted the glass and stood carefully examining the broad landscape