time no little alarmed--there was no mystery about the
matter. For he could see at a glance that the bird so assailing him was
a hornbill; and a moment's reflection told him it was the cock.

Afar off in the forest--no doubt in search of food--catering for his
housekeeper and their new chick, of whose birth he was most probably
aware, he could not have heard her cries of distress; else would he have
rushed to the rescue, and appeared much sooner upon the scene. But at
length he had arrived; and with one glance gathered in the ruin that had
occurred during his absence. There was his carefully plastered wall
pulled down, the interior of his domicile laid open, his darlings gone,
no doubt dragged out, throttled and slaughtered, by the young robber
still standing but a step from the door.

The enraged parent did not pause to look downward, else he might have
seen a still more heart-rending spectacle at the bottom of the tree. He
did not stay for this; on the instant he went swoop at the head of the
destroyer, with a scream that rang far over the forest, and echoed in a
thousand reverberations through the branches of the trees.

Fortunately for Henry, he had on his head a thick cloth cap, with its
crown cotton-padded. But for this, which served as a helmet, the beak
of the bird would have been into his skull, for at the first dab it
struck right at his crown.

At the second onslaught, which followed quick after, Henry, being
warned, was enabled to ward off the blow, parrying with one hand, while
with the other supporting himself on his perch. For all this the danger
was not at an end; as the bird, instead of being scared away, or showing
any signs of an intention to retreat, only seemed to become more
infuriated by the resistance, and continued its swooping and screaming
more vigorously and determinedly than ever. The boy was well aware of
the peril that impended; and so, too, were those below; who, of course,
at the first screech of the hornbill, had looked up and seen what was
passing above them.

They would have called upon him to come down, and he would have done so
without being summoned, if there had been a chance. But there was none:
for he could not descend a single step without using both hands on the
ladder; and to do this would leave his face and head without protection.
Either left unguarded for a single instant, and the beak of the bird,
playing about like a pickaxe, would be struck into his skull, o