s, each containing twenty-one men, which
had evidently emerged from a small creek about half a mile lower down,
and were now drawing near with unmistakably hostile intentions.

"This looks awkward, Dick," exclaimed Stukely, seizing his bow and
arrows. "Surely they cannot seriously intend to try to stop us?"

"If they don't, why are they laying their canoes across our hawse like
thicky?" demanded Dick. "Hadn't you better speak to them a bit, Phil?"

"Ay, I'll try," answered Stukely. And, stepping into the bows of the
canoe, he ostentatiously laid down his weapons and made the usual signs
of amity. The reply was a yell of anger and hatred from the Indians,
who were blocking the way, while one of them, springing to his feet,
shouted:

"Go back, dogs of Spaniards; go back! This is the land of the Mayubuna,
and we will permit no Spaniard to set foot upon its soil. We have no
desire to be swallowed up, as Atahuallpa and his people were, after he
had welcomed you to his country; therefore go back--or die!"

"They take us for Spaniards," explained Phil to Dick; and, raising his
hands, he shouted back:

"People of the Mayubuna, you are mistaken; we are not Spaniards, but are
the enemies of the Spaniard, and the friends of all who hate them. We
are on our way up the river to fight them, now; and we beg you to give
us free passage through your land, and also a little cassava."

A laugh of derision greeted this statement; and the Indian who had just
spoken shouted in reply:

"You lie, dog and son of a dog; you are Spaniards, for your skins are
light, like theirs, and one of you has a beard." And suddenly raising
his bow, the speaker discharged an arrow at Phil, which whizzed past
within half an inch of that gentleman's ear.

"Make as though you intended to run down that canoe," ordered Phil.
Then, seizing his bow and fitting an arrow to the string, he answered:

"Fools! we are English, I tell you, and the deadly enemies of the
Spaniard; therefore let us pass in peace, otherwise must we make a
passage for ourselves by force of arms."

The reply to this was another scornful laugh and a flight of arrows from
every Indian in the two opposing canoes. By a miracle Phil again
escaped unhurt, although no less than five arrows lodged in the
puma-skin tunic which he was wearing, and the sail of the canoe was
literally riddled with them. He felt that the matter was getting beyond
a joke, that the time for fair speaking w