giving utterance to that
strange barking cough, it glided down the tree, and made direct for the
one who was nearest.

As ill luck would have it, this chanced to be the little Helen,
altogether defenceless and unarmed. Murtagh, still shouting, rushed to
the rescue; while Henry, with his musket raised to his shoulder,
endeavoured to get between the ape and its intended victim, so that he
could fire right into the face of the assailant, without endangering the
life of his sister.

He would have been in time had the gun proved true, which it did not.
It was an old flint musket, and the priming had got damp during their
journey through the moist tropical forest. As he pulled trigger, there
was not even a flash in the pan; and although he instinctively grasped
the gun by its barrel, and, using it as a club, commenced belabouring
the hairy giant over the head, his blows were of no more avail than if
directed against the trunk of the tree itself.

Once, twice, three times the butt of the gun descended upon the skull of
the satyr, protected by its thick shock of coarse red hair; but before a
fourth blow could be given, the ape threw out one of its immense arms,
and carrying it round in a rapid sweep, caught the form of the girl in
its embrace, and then, close hugging her against its hairy breast,
commenced reascending the tree.

Shouts and shrieks were of no avail to detain the horrid abductor. Nor
yet the boy's strength, exerted to its utmost. His strength alone; for
Murtagh was not yet up. Henry seized the gorilla's leg, and clung to it
as long as ever he could. He was dragged several feet up the trunk; but
a kick from the gorilla shook him off, and he fell, stunned and almost
senseless, to the earth.

CHAPTER THIRTY.

WHAT WILL BECOME OF HER?

It would be impossible to paint the despair that wrung her brother's
heart, as he stood with upturned face and eyes bent upon a scene in
which he had no longer the power to take part.

Not much less intense was the agonised emotion of Murtagh; for little
Helen was almost as dear to the Irishman as if she had been his own
daughter.

Neither could have any other thought than that the child was lost beyond
hope of recovery. She would either be torn to pieces by the claws of
the monster, or by its great yellow teeth, already displayed to their
view, and flung in mangled fragments to the ground. They actually stood
for some time in expectation of seeing this sad cat