l, in one of those questionable labyrinths still existing
in the most civilized Italian cities, would certainly not run less risk
than in facing the dangers of the forest. The dart, the trap, the attack
of beast and reptile may be, with courage and calmness, averted or
parried, but the evils which menace man, under the hypocritical
euphemisms of Society (ever ready to vaunt its impeachableness) injure
not only the body but, what is worse, the spirit.

Those who succumb to the latter are ofttimes induced to lament that
death does not come swift enough to kill their flesh, after their souls
and intellects have been long since slain and consumed.

In the thick of the jungle the spirit rises and wanders free; there are
no restraints or limits to its flight. It is inebriated by the simple
and serene joys of living; it is pervaded by a current of new, potent
energy that makes one feel--alone, in Nature's realm--either immensely
great or infinitely small; exquisitely good or miserably wicked.

It is not prudent, when travelling in the forest, to let philosophy make
us linger long on the way, but there are some moments in which one's
inner life is so intense, in which thought and sentiment are so
impetuous that that fleeting atom of time is in itself sufficient to
mark an indelible epoch in the existence of men. Who knows but what if
Mephistopheles had lead Faust into the virgin forest, and there left him
free to his speculations, if the famous invocation would ever have
escaped from the fevered lips of the doctor?

But... what is this hissing? It is not the spirit that denies; it is a
snake I have disturbed along my path and that has not found my
philosophizing over pleasant (like you, perhaps, kind reader) and so I
will cut short my digression.

* * * * *

The forest abounds in reptiles. There are innumerable varieties of
serpents, big and small, venomous and harmless. It may almost be said
(especially towards the plain) that every bush and every tree has one of
these inhabitants.

The commonest species are the _tigi rilo_, the _tigi paa_ and the _tigi
dolo_ but the most feared are the _sendok_ and the _bimaa_.

[Illustration: Cooking in a bamboo saucepan.

_p._ 72.]

As a rule none of these snakes will assail a person unless they have
been molested. They remain either rolled up close to a tree or lazily
swinging from one of its branches, keeping hold of it with its powerful
tail and