he men
were arming themselves with ugly krises and heavy parangs.

I had not much hope of finding the tiger, much less of rescuing Baboo,
dead or alive. The jungle loomed up like an impassable wall on all
three sides of the compound, so dense, compact, and interwoven, that
a bird could not fly through it. Still I knew that my men, if they
had the courage, could follow where the tiger led, and could cut a
path for me.

Aboo Din unloosed a half-dozen pariah dogs that we kept for wild pig,
and led them to the spot where the tiger had last lain. In an instant
the entire pack sent up a doleful howl and slunk back to their kennels.

Aboo Din lashed them mercilessly and drove them into the jungle,
where he followed on his hands and knees. I only waited to don my
green kaki suit and canvas shooting hat and despatch a man to the
neighboring kampong, or village, to ask the punghulo (chief) to send
me his shikaris, or hunters. Then I plunged into the jungle path
that my kebuns had cut with their keen parangs, or jungle-knives. Ten
feet within the confines of the forest the metallic glare of the sun
and the pitiless reflections of the China Sea were lost in a dim,
green twilight. Far ahead I could hear the half-hearted snarls of
the cowardly, deserting curs, and Aboo Din's angry voice rapidly
exhausting the curses of the Koran on their heads.

My men, who were naked save for a cotton sarong wound around their
waists, slashed here a rubber-vine, there a thorny rattan, and again
a mass of creepers that were as tenacious as iron ropes, all the time
pressing forward at a rapid walk. Ofttimes the trail led from the
solid ground through a swamp where grew great sago palms, and out
of which a black, sluggish stream flowed toward the straits. Gray
iguanas and pendants of dove orchids hung from the limbs above,
and green and gold lizards scuttled up the trees at our approach.

At the first plot of wet ground Aboo Din sent up a shout, and awaited
my coming. I found him on his hands and knees, gazing stupidly at
the prints in the moist earth.

"Tuan," he shouted, "see Baboo's feet, one--two--three--more! Praise
be to Allah!"

I dropped down among the lily-pads and pitcher-plants beside him.
There, sure enough, close by the catlike footmarks of the tiger, was
the perfect impression of one of Baboo's bare feet. Farther on was the
imprint of another, and then a third. Wonderful! The intervals between
the several footmarks were far enoug