all the ferocity and nearly the strength of mad bulls.
Presently one of them tripped the other but in that viselike embrace
one could not fall alone--Es-sat dragged Om-at with him, toppling upon
the brink of the niche. Even Tarzan held his breath. There they surged
to and fro perilously for a moment and then the inevitable
happened--the two, locked in murderous embrace, rolled over the edge
and disappeared from the ape-man's view.

Tarzan voiced a suppressed sigh for he had liked Om-at and then, with
Ta-den, approached the edge and looked over. Far below, in the dim
light of the coming dawn, two inert forms should be lying stark in
death; but, to Tarzan's amazement, such was far from the sight that met
his eyes. Instead, there were the two figures still vibrant with life
and still battling only a few feet below him. Clinging always to the
pegs with two holds--a hand and a foot, or a foot and a tail, they
seemed as much at home upon the perpendicular wall as upon the level
surface of the vestibule; but now their tactics were slightly altered,
for each seemed particularly bent upon dislodging his antagonist from
his holds and precipitating him to certain death below. It was soon
evident that Om-at, younger and with greater powers of endurance than
Es-sat, was gaining an advantage. Now was the chief almost wholly on
the defensive. Holding him by the cross belt with one mighty hand Om-at
was forcing his foeman straight out from the cliff, and with the other
hand and one foot was rapidly breaking first one of Es-sat's holds and
then another, alternating his efforts, or rather punctuating them, with
vicious blows to the pit of his adversary's stomach. Rapidly was Es-sat
weakening and with the knowledge of impending death there came, as
there comes to every coward and bully under similar circumstances, a
crumbling of the veneer of bravado which had long masqueraded as
courage and with it crumbled his code of ethics. Now was Es-sat no
longer chief of Kor-ul-ja--instead he was a whimpering craven battling
for life. Clutching at Om-at, clutching at the nearest pegs he sought
any support that would save him from that awful fall, and as he strove
to push aside the hand of death, whose cold fingers he already felt
upon his heart, his tail sought Om-at's side and the handle of the
knife that hung there.

Tarzan saw and even as Es-sat drew the blade from its sheath he dropped
catlike to the pegs beside the battling men. Es-sat's tai