.

"To-day, and every day after we meet the cannibals, make no suspicious
moves. Do not speak harshly. Do not laugh or sneer at them. They are
unreasoning and easily insulted, and lifelong foes when angered. Let me
do the talking.

"Do not hold a gun in a threatening manner or draw pistols unless you
must fight. Then kill.

"Above all, pay no attention to their women.

"Now we go. I lead."

He turned and strode away into the fog as easily and surely as if
cat-eyed and cat-footed. Pedro swung nonchalantly after him. The others
followed in order, hitching at their backstraps.

The ghostly haze about them now was paler, but through the interstices
overhead came no glint of sunshine, nor even the glow of a clear dawn.
The whole sky evidently was overcast, and around the marching men the
gloom still lay thick. Yet Lourenco's eyes seemed to bore through the
shades and the dark shroud blurring the trunks, for his steady gait did
not falter. The little file hung close together, for all knew that any
man straggling would be instantly lost.

Worming around gigantic columns, crawling over rotting trunks long laid
low, changing direction abruptly when blocked by some great butt too
high to be scaled, sinking ankle-deep in clinging mud, the venturesome
band wound along through the wilderness. Repeated glances at his compass
showed McKay that the general trend of the march was southeast; but the
impassable obstacles encountered at frequent intervals necessitated not
only detours, but sometimes actual back-tracking.

"Walk four miles to advance one," was his thought. And for some time it
seemed that such was the case. But then the ground changed, the light
improved, the trees thinned, and the undergrowth became more dense--and,
paradoxically, the rate of progress improved.

This was because the smaller growth gave the two leaders a chance to cut
their way straight onward instead of dodging about; and cut they did.
Their machetes swung with untiring energy, opening a path through what
seemed an impenetrable tangle. Now every yard of movement was a yard
gained. But the ground was rising and the struggle up some of the sharp
slopes winded more than one man.

Then the slope dipped the other way, and they slipped down into a ravine
where water gleamed darkly. Here a halt was called while the leaders
sought for a fallen tree. Tim squatted and mopped his face for the
hundredth time.

"Gosh! This is what I call travelin'!" he pa