ss panic seized in an instant upon every Indian
present; for shriek after shriek told that the alligators were still
busy; while the remaining four canoes, which had also been hastening to
the rescue, suddenly paused, evidently fearful lest, if they approached
the scene of the disaster, they, too, might be involved in it.

Meanwhile, the Englishmen, taking the fullest possible advantage of the
situation, slid at a safe distance past the spot where the Indians were
all struggling in the water in a vain effort to right their canoes and
climb into them, and, favoured by a freshening breeze, pursued their way
up the river. But although they had escaped for the moment, Phil and
Dick still had plenty of cause for anxiety; for they had by this time
been long enough in the wilds to have learned that when Indians are
hostile their hostility is very bitter and pertinacious; and they could
scarcely hope that, having mistaken them for Spaniards--who at that time
were more feared and hated than any other earthly thing by the Indians--
the Mayubuna would be satisfied with the issue of their first encounter
with the white men. Moreover to add to the difficulties of the said
white men, evening was now drawing on apace, the sun had already sunk so
low that his beams were unable to pierce the forest on their right hand,
while the orange glow which suffused the tree-tops on their left told
them as plainly as words that the great luminary was within a brief
half-hour of his setting. And, unfortunately, there was no moon just
then; while without the light of the moon it was impossible to use the
river at night. It would therefore be imperatively necessary for them
to seek quickly a place of concealment wherein to pass the night if they
wished to avoid being overtaken by darkness on the river; they therefore
now proceeded to look anxiously about them for such a place.
Eventually, when the brief twilight of the tropics was closing down upon
the scene and the fireflies were beginning to appear, they sighted a
spot which, while by no means ideal for their purpose, might possibly be
made to serve.

It lay about a hundred yards up a small creek branching out of the main
stream, and as it was the only spot at all suitable which they had seen
since their encounter with the Indians, they really had no choice but to
avail themselves of it. It consisted of a little grassy mead of about
two acres in extent, lying quite open to view from the main r