nightmare the whole thing is! You remember the great bristle of sharp
canes down below where we found the skeleton of the American? Well,
that is just under ape-town, and that's the jumpin'-off place of their
prisoners. I expect there's heaps of skeletons there, if we looked for
'em. They have a sort of clear parade-ground on the top, and they make
a proper ceremony about it. One by one the poor devils have to jump,
and the game is to see whether they are merely dashed to pieces or
whether they get skewered on the canes. They took us out to see it,
and the whole tribe lined up on the edge. Four of the Indians jumped,
and the canes went through 'em like knittin' needles through a pat of
butter. No wonder we found that poor Yankee's skeleton with the canes
growin' between his ribs. It was horrible--but it was doocedly
interestin' too. We were all fascinated to see them take the dive,
even when we thought it would be our turn next on the spring-board.

"Well, it wasn't. They kept six of the Indians up for to-day--that's
how I understood it--but I fancy we were to be the star performers in
the show. Challenger might get off, but Summerlee and I were in the
bill. Their language is more than half signs, and it was not hard to
follow them. So I thought it was time we made a break for it. I had
been plottin' it out a bit, and had one or two things clear in my mind.
It was all on me, for Summerlee was useless and Challenger not much
better. The only time they got together they got slangin' because they
couldn't agree upon the scientific classification of these red-headed
devils that had got hold of us. One said it was the dryopithecus of
Java, the other said it was pithecanthropus. Madness, I call
it--Loonies, both. But, as I say, I had thought out one or two points
that were helpful. One was that these brutes could not run as fast as
a man in the open. They have short, bandy legs, you see, and heavy
bodies. Even Challenger could give a few yards in a hundred to the
best of them, and you or I would be a perfect Shrubb. Another point
was that they knew nothin' about guns. I don't believe they ever
understood how the fellow I shot came by his hurt. If we could get at
our guns there was no sayin' what we could do.

"So I broke away early this mornin', gave my guard a kick in the tummy
that laid him out, and sprinted for the camp. There I got you and the
guns, and here we are."

"But the professors!" I c