seemed interminable. We kept to the
glades as much as possible, but they always ended in more thick forest.
Sometimes we thought we had escaped, and sat down to rest; but
always, before we could recover our breath, we would hear the hateful
"Whoo-whoo!" cries and the terrible "Goek! Goek! Goek!" This latter
sometimes terminated in a savage "Ha ha ha ha haaaaa!!!"

And in this fashion were we hunted through the forest by the exasperated
Tree People. At last, by mid-afternoon, the slopes began rising higher
and higher and the trees were becoming smaller. Then we came out on the
grassy flanks of the mountains. Here was where we could make time, and
here the Tree People gave up and returned to their forest.

The mountains were bleak and inhospitable, and three times that
afternoon we tried to regain the woods. But the Tree People were lying
in wait, and they drove us back. Lop-Ear and I slept that night in a
dwarf tree, no larger than a bush. Here was no security, and we would
have been easy prey for any hunting animal that chanced along.

In the morning, what of our new-gained respect for the Tree People, we
faced into the mountains. That we had no definite plan, or even idea, I
am confident. We were merely driven on by the danger we had escaped. Of
our wanderings through the mountains I have only misty memories. We were
in that bleak region many days, and we suffered much, especially from
fear, it was all so new and strange. Also, we suffered from the cold,
and later from hunger.

It--was a desolate land of rocks and foaming streams and clattering
cataracts. We climbed and descended mighty canyons and gorges; and ever,
from every view point, there spread out before us, in all directions,
range upon range, the unceasing mountains. We slept at night in holes
and crevices, and on one cold night we perched on top a slender pinnacle
of rock that was almost like a tree.

And then, at last, one hot midday, dizzy with hunger, we gained the
divide. From this high backbone of earth, to the north, across the
diminishing, down-falling ranges, we caught a glimpse of a far lake. The
sun shone upon it, and about it were open, level grass-lands, while to
the eastward we saw the dark line of a wide-stretching forest.

We were two days in gaining the lake, and we were weak with hunger; but
on its shore, sleeping snugly in a thicket, we found a part-grown calf.
It gave us much trouble, for we knew no other way to kill than with our
h