rse?" said Sir John.

"Oh yes, sir, and beetles too, some of the ugliest you can imagine, and
some of them looking as if made of burnished metal. Then of course
you'll have plenty of fireflies and mosquitoes too."

"Of course we shall get them," said Sir John. "But what about
serpents?"

"Plenty, sir, sea and land; curious lizards too."

"There will be no animals to shoot," said the doctor rather regretfully.

"Tigers, elephants, or leopards? No, not unless we make for the
mainland. But there is a great deal of unexplored country on the coast
of New Guinea and Borneo, and there's no knowing what we might come
across. There are elephants in Borneo, and our old friend the
orang-outang."

"Let's try one of the smaller islands first," said Sir John. "I'm
getting eager to begin doing something."

"I can't exist much longer doing nothing but parade up and down this
deck. My joints are growing up. How do you feel, Jack?" said the
doctor.

"Lazy. I feel as if I could go on doing nothing for any length of
time."

"Here, this won't do," cried the doctor in mock horror. "'Bout ship,
captain, and let's get back home, or else to one of these wonderful
islands that make my mouth water. Let me see, something of this kind: a
beach of coral with the waves always rolling over and breaking in foam,
so that just within there is a beautiful blue lagoon of water, calm as a
lake. Across the lake stretched right and left golden sands, at the
back of which are cocoa-nut groves, with their great fern-like leaves
rustling in the sea-breeze, crabs and fish scuttling about beneath them;
and farther on where the land commences to rise the glorious tropic
forest begins, trailed with orchids and wonderful creepers. Great palms
rise like columns, and huge trees of the fig persuasion spread and drop
down at several spots to form green bowers, and capital places to make
huts. Monkeys climbing about. Birds swarming--nesting or swinging by
the rotan canes. Farther on the land rising and rising, and all forest
till it begins to be seamed with valleys, or rather deep gorges which
run up to the central mountain, from which they radiate all round down
toward the sea, and all of them forming glorious collecting grounds for
naturalists. Then higher up the air growing cooler, save for a peculiar
hot puff now and then with a taste in it of sulphurous steam. Then the
trees growing thinner and not so majestic, but the flowers more abunda