ensued, and every savage stood death-still, gazing with eyes of
horror upon the hissing fiery thing as it darted hither and thither
inflicting painful burns and bruises wherever it went. Then, long
before the first had run its course, the second was also among them,
playing similar antics, and working havoc like the first; and then out
swooped the third at them, driving the whole party crazy with terror,
and producing a state of utterly indescribable confusion. As the fourth
rocket tore out of the midst of the belt of bush a general yell of
dismay arose, and then ensued a regular stampede, the natives knocking
down and falling over each other in their frenzied efforts to escape
from the onslaught of the fiery monsters. Before the last rocket had
sped there was not a savage to be seen, the whole swarm of them, down to
the children even, having somehow managed to make their escape into the
adjacent bush, from which their cries of terror could still be heard
proceeding, while several of the huts were already bursting into flame.
In the midst of the deserted open space the eleven upright stakes were
now plainly visible; four of them, alas! black and half-consumed with
fire, with great heaps of still smouldering and faintly smoking ashes--
in the midst of which were discernible the calcined fragments of human
skeletons--around their bases, while to each of the other seven was
bound the naked body of a white man!

"Now, forward, lads!" cried I, dashing into the open with drawn sword in
my hand. "Cut loose those seven men, and then form up ready for a
retreat to the boat. If we are quick we may do all that we came to do
before the savages return."

It was but a run of a few hundred yards from the bush to the posts, and
in another minute we were around them, cutting and hacking at the
multitudinous coils of tough creeper which bound the prisoners to the
posts; and in another couple of minutes the last man had been released.
Dazed and speechless at the suddenness of their deliverance from a
lingering death of frightful torment, such as they had beheld inflicted
upon four of their unfortunate companions, the rescued mutineers were
being hurried down to the boat. To bundle them in pell-mell, scramble
in ourselves, and shove off was the work of but a few brief minutes; and
presently we found ourselves once more in the creek, with our bows
pointed river-ward, and eight men straining at the oars as we swept
foaming past the i