s to flag.

"I can't hear it, sir," he whispered.

"So it can't be coming," said the major, looking uneasy. "I'm puzzled,
Mark. It was neither lion nor tiger, though something like the roar a
lion can give; it was not like an elephant's trumpeting, nor the
grunting of a rhinoceros; and it could not be a hippopotamus, for we are
out of their range, and there is no big river--there can't be--here."

"Could it be some enormous serpent?" whispered Mark.

"I never heard a serpent do anything but hiss, my lad, though they say
the anacondas make strange thunder in the North American forests."

"It might be a large crocodile."

"Yes, it might," said the major; "but if it was, the noise is something
quite new to me."

"It is more likely to be some terrible beast here that we never heard of
before, sir," faltered Mark. "Don't laugh at me, sir, I can't help
feeling nervous."

"You'd be a wonder if you could," said the major. "I feel ten times as
uncomfortable as I did at any time yesterday. We knew what we had to
meet then, but this is something--"

Whoor-r-oor!

The sound came again with terrible violence, but though it was as
horrible and awe-inspiring it was either farther away or the animal
which uttered the cry had turned its head in another direction.

"It's beyond me, Mark, my lad," said the major, drawing a long breath;
"but it can't see us here, whatever it is, and it is something strange
to be roaring like that by day."

"I wonder it has not woke anyone up," whispered Mark.

"Worn out," replied the major, laconically; and then they stood peering
out from among the trees, and watching intently for a long time without
hearing a sound, till the cricket began to utter its chirruping note
again.

This was taken up by another close by, and by another at a distance, and
then quite a chorus followed, resembling the sounds made by the
house-cricket of the English hearth, but more whirring and ear-piercing.

"It must have gone back into the jungle, Mark," said the major, "or else
fallen asleep. Anyhow I'm not at all pleased to find we have such a
neighbour."

"Do you think it is a dangerous beast?" whispered Mark.

"I can't say till I've seen it, but it sounds very much like it."

"I know what it is!" said Mark in a low excited voice.

"You do?"

"Yes. It is in that jungle, yonder."

"I don't know where it is, but it must be somewhere near. Well, what is
it?"

"A wild man of the woods."

"Wha