up into the trees.

"Game!" exclaimed Louis contemptuously. "Monkeys!"

"Didn't you shoot a couple of them yesterday afternoon, Louis?"

"I did; but I wanted them in order to study the creature. Now every
fellow knows what a proboscis monkey is, as he did not before except by
name. I got my books out, and read him up with the animal before me. I
am glad I did; for the picture of him I had seen was nothing like him
in his nasal appendage, which gives him his name."

"What is the reason of that?"

"The portrait was taken from a young one, before his nose had attained
its full growth. But I don't believe in shooting monkeys for the fun of
it. Our party are not inclined to eat them."

"I'd as soon eat a cat as a monkey," added Felix.

"Then, don't shoot those long-nosed fellows, for we have all the
specimens of them we need," said Louis.

"What are you going to do with them, my darling? You can't keep them
much longer, and you will have to throw them overboard, for they won't
smell sweet by to-morrow."

"Achang learned something about taxidermy from the naturalist he
travelled with, and he has promised to skin and mount one of them for
me."

"But what's that you are making, Louis?" asked Felix, who had been
trying to take the measure of the implement the young Cr[oe]sus was
fashioning.

Its use was not at all evident. A triangular piece had been sawed out of
the end of a strip of board four inches wide, and the rest of it had
been cut down and rounded off, and the thing looked more like a
pitchfork than anything else.

"Is it to pitch hay with?" persisted Felix.

[Illustration: "WHAT HAVE YOU GOT THERE, MR. BELGRAVE?"

_Page 41._]

"No, it is not; when you see me use it, you will know what it is for.
You must wait till that time before you know," replied Louis, who
appeared to have finished the implement just as the other brought his
gun to his shoulder.

"That's the handsomest schnake I iver saw since me modther, long life to
her, left ould Ireland before I was bahrn."

"Don't shoot him, Flix!" protested Louis vigorously. "Where is he?"

"Jist forninst the bow of the boat. Sure, Oi'm the schnake-killer of the
party, and he's moi game."

"I don't want him killed yet," replied Louis, as he moved forward from
the waist with the forked stick in his hand. "He is handsome, as you
say, Flix."

Creeping very cautiously till he could see over the bow, he discovered
the serpent, which was nearly six feet l