the universally useful bamboo, we bore it
off in triumph to our mansion, and very soon had some delicious steaks
cooking before our fire.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN.

CARRIED OFF BY SAVAGES.

I do not know whether a more than usually substantial supper made us
sleep sounder than we were wont to do, but the sun had already risen
when, the next morning, I started up, hearing as I fancied some strange
noises near us. My two companions were still asleep on their bamboo
couches on either side of the hut. The noises seemed to me like human
voices. Oliver and Macco must have heard them also, for directly
afterwards they also started up, and looked about them with a somewhat
startled expression of countenance.

We sprang to the door of the hut. On opening it, we saw directly below
it a number of dark-skinned savages, almost destitute of clothing, some
of them having huge black mop heads, while others had simply thick
woolly hair. From this I knew them at once, as well as from their
strongly-marked, ferocious features, to be Papuans, or inhabitants of
New Guinea. They seemed as much surprised at seeing us as we were at
seeing them, and shouted out to us in a language we of course could not
understand. By their signs, however, we knew that they were telling us
to come down to them. This, from their unprepossessing appearance, we
were not well-disposed to do. Probably they supposed we possessed
fire-arms, and were therefore unwilling to approach nearer. They had
just landed, we knew, from seeing two long, low canoes with high stems
and sterns rudely carved and surmounted by plumes of feathers. A row of
mother-of-pearl shells apparently ornamented each side of the gunwale.
The men were armed with bows and arrows and huge clubs. Some of them
also had spears in their hands, but we saw no guns among them. This was
satisfactory. However, from their numbers we knew too well that they
could easily overpower us, if they had evil intentions.

Again they shouted to us, and we shouted in return, putting out our
hands, and making other signs to show that we desired to be friends.
They only answered by still louder shouts, some of them apparently
laughing at our appearance. They now began to approach, one party
coming up on one side, one on another, and a third in the centre. We
still held our post, hoping that they might not come to extremities. We
thought, too, that perhaps, seeing three people at the door, they might
supp