him. The noises were
undoubtedly caused by fishes or crocodiles, which would not come on
board, and he dropped off to sleep, and then awoke, as if directly, to
lie staring at the dim cabin lamp against the roof, and wonder what was
the meaning of the heavy feeling of oppression from which he suffered.

"Was it a nightmare?" he asked himself. Certainly there was something
upon his chest, and it was moving. He could feel it plainly stirring
all over him, and he was about to give himself a violent wrench when
something passed between his eyes and the cabin lantern--something so
horrible that it froze all his faculties into a state of inaction. For
he saw distinctly the glistening of burnished scales, and a serpent's
head at the end of an undulating neck, and directly after a forked
flickering tongue touched and played about his face.

CHAPTER FOUR.

SNAKES.

"It's only a dream-nightmare; but how horribly real," said Oliver Lane
to himself, as a feeling of resignation came over him, and he lay there
waiting for his imagination to be darkened over by a deeper sleep.

For there was an utter cessation of all sense of fear, and in quite a
philosophical fashion, he began to think of how clear it all was, and
how his mind could occupy mentally the position of a spectator, and look
on at the vivid picture in which his body was playing so important a
part.

"I know how it is," he thought; "I asked myself this afternoon whether
the writhing creatures I saw moving about in the mud were sea-snakes,
and directly after I began looking away among the trees, and wondering
whether there were any big boas among their branches. One generally can
trace one's dreams."

And all the time the weight upon his chest increased, and the pressure
grew more suffocating, while the serpent's head played about his lips,
touching them from time to time with its moist, cool tongue.

He felt then that, in accordance with all he had read, the monster would
now begin to cover him with what the wild beast showman call "its
serlimer," and then proceed to swallow him slowly, till he lay like a
great knot somewhere down its distended body, while the reptile went to
sleep for a month.

"And that wouldn't do for me," thought Oliver, as he felt quite amused
at the thought. "I want to be up and doing; so, as all these horrible
nightmare dreams come to an end, and as writers say, just at the most
intense moment--then I awoke, I think I've had enoug