“No, no, indeed. With our limited means of transport such an undertaking would have been rash in the extreme. We had better have kept to the coast forever rather than incur such a risk. Our destination, San Felice, is on this side of the range, and in order to reach it, we shall not have to leave the plateau, of which the greatest elevation is but little over 1,500 feet.”
“And you say,” Dick persisted, “that you have really no fear of losing your way in a forest such as this, a forest into which you have never set foot before?”
“No fear whatever,” Harris answered; “so accustomed am I to travelling of this kind, that I can steer my way by a thousand signs revealing themselves in the growth of the trees, and in the composition of the soil, which would never present themselves to your notice. I assure you that I anticipate no difficulties.”
This conversation was not heard by any of the rest of the party. Harris seemed to speak as frankly as he did fearlessly, and Dick felt that there might be, after all, no just grounds for any of his own misgivings.
Five days passed by, and the 12th of April arrived without any special incident. Nine miles had been the average distance accomplished in a day; regular periods of rest had been taken, and, except that Jack’s spirits had somewhat flagged, the fatigue did not seem to have interfered with the general good health of the travellers.
First disappointed of his India-rubber-tree, and then of his hummingbirds, Jack had inquired about the beautiful parrots which he had been led to expect he should see in this wonderful forest. Where were the bright green macaws? where were the gaudy aras with their bare white cheeks and pointed tails, which seem never to light upon the ground? and where, too, were all the brilliant parroquets, with their feathered faces, and indeed the whole variety of those forest chatterers of which the Indians affirm that they speak the language of nations long extinct?
It is true that there was no lack of the common grey parrots with crimson tails, but these were no novelty; Jack had seen plenty of them before, for owing to their reputation of being the most clever in mimickry of the Psittacidae, they have been domesticated everywhere in both the Old and New worlds.
But Jack’s dissatisfaction was nothing compared to Cousin Benedict’s. In spite of being allowed to wander away from the rank, he had failed to discover a single insect which was worth the pursuit; not even a firefly danced at night; nature seemed to be mocking him, and his ill-humour increased accordingly.
In this way the journey was continued for four days longer, and on the 16th it was estimated that they must have travelled between eighty and ninety miles northeastwards from the coast. Harris positively asserted that they could not be much more than twenty miles from San Felice, and that by pushing forwards they might expect in eight-and-forty hours to find themselves lodged in comfortable quarters.
But although they had thus succeeded in traversing this vast tableland, they had not seen one human inhabitant. Dick was more than ever perplexed, and it was a subject of bitter regret to him that they had not stranded upon some more frequented part of the shore, near some village or plantation where Mrs. Weldon might long since have found a suitable refuge.
Deserted, however, as the country apparently was by man, it had latterly shown itself much more abundantly tenanted by animals. Many a time a long, plaintive cry was heard, which Harris attributed to the tardigrades or sloths often found in wooded districts, and known by the name of “ais;” and in the middle of the dinner-halt on this day, a loud hissing suddenly broke upon the air which made Mrs. Weldon start to her feet in alarm.
“A serpent!” cried Dick, catching up his loaded gun.
The negroes, following Dick’s example, were in a moment on the alert.
“Don’t fire!” cried Harris.
There was indeed nothing improbable in the supposition that a “sucuru,” a species of boa, sometimes measuring forty feet in length, had just moved itself in the long grass at their side, but Harris affirmed that the “sucuru” never hisses, and declared that the noise had really come from animals of an entirely inoffensive character.
“What animals?” asked Dick, always eager for information, which it must be granted Harris seemed always equally anxious to give.
“Antelopes,” replied Harris; “but, hush! not a sound, or you will frighten them away.”
“Antelopes!” cried Dick; “I must see them; I must get close to them.”
“More easily said than done,” answered Harris, shaking his head; but Dick was not to be diverted from his purpose, and, gun in hand, crept into the grass. He had not advanced many yards before a herd of about a dozen gazelles, graceful in body, with short, pointed horns, dashed past him like a glowing cloud, and disappeared in the underwood without giving him time to take a shot.
“I told you beforehand what you would have to expect,” said Harris, as Dick, with a considerable sense of disappointment, returned to the party.
Impossible, however, as it had been fairly to scrutinize the antelopes, such was hardly the case with another herd of animals, the identification of which led to a somewhat singular discussion between Harris and the rest.
About four o’clock on the afternoon of the same day, the travellers were halting for a few moments near an opening in the forest, when three or four large animals emerged from a thicket about a hundred paces ahead, and scampered off at full speed. In spite of what Harris had urged, Dick put his gun to his shoulder, and was on the very point of firing, when Harris knocked the rifle quickly aside.
“They were giraffes!” shouted Dick.
The announcement awakened the curiosity of Jack, who quickly scrambled to his feet upon the saddle on which he was lounging.
“My dear Dick,” said Mrs. Weldon, “there are no giraffes
