as many minutes in a vain effort to keep pace with him,
and soon was left hopelessly behind.

Fearing that he would again be irretrievably lost, he called aloud to
the wild man ahead of him, and in a moment had the satisfaction of
seeing him drop lightly to his side from the branches above.

For a moment Tarzan looked at the young man closely, as though
undecided as to just what was best to do; then, stooping down before
Clayton, he motioned him to grasp him about the neck, and, with the
white man upon his back, Tarzan took to the trees.

The next few minutes the young Englishman never forgot. High into
bending and swaying branches he was borne with what seemed to him
incredible swiftness, while Tarzan chafed at the slowness of his
progress.

From one lofty branch the agile creature swung with Clayton through a
dizzy arc to a neighboring tree; then for a hundred yards maybe the
sure feet threaded a maze of interwoven limbs, balancing like a
tightrope walker high above the black depths of verdure beneath.

From the first sensation of chilling fear Clayton passed to one of keen
admiration and envy of those giant muscles and that wondrous instinct
or knowledge which guided this forest god through the inky blackness of
the night as easily and safely as Clayton would have strolled a London
street at high noon.

Occasionally they would enter a spot where the foliage above was less
dense, and the bright rays of the moon lit up before Clayton's
wondering eyes the strange path they were traversing.

At such times the man fairly caught his breath at sight of the horrid
depths below them, for Tarzan took the easiest way, which often led
over a hundred feet above the earth.

And yet with all his seeming speed, Tarzan was in reality feeling his
way with comparative slowness, searching constantly for limbs of
adequate strength for the maintenance of this double weight.

Presently they came to the clearing before the beach. Tarzan's quick
ears had heard the strange sounds of Sabor's efforts to force her way
through the lattice, and it seemed to Clayton that they dropped a
straight hundred feet to earth, so quickly did Tarzan descend. Yet
when they struck the ground it was with scarce a jar; and as Clayton
released his hold on the ape-man he saw him dart like a squirrel for
the opposite side of the cabin.

The Englishman sprang quickly after him just in time to see the hind
quarters of some huge animal about to disappear