and in due time a score of stalwart
young Dyaks arrived. After resting he started again with them.

What with drink and interest Baker was now jovially excited. In passing
through the house he noticed a door festooned with greenery. A noise of
howling came through it. He asked Tuzzadeen what this meant. Tuzzadeen,
Malay and Moslem, was much amused.

'Baby born!' he laughed. 'Father go to bed; mother feed him with rice and
salt.'

'Feed the father?' Baker cried.

'Yes. Them naked chaps say father's child, not mother's. Women cry over
him. You hear?'

'Lord 'a mercy, I must see this!' And before Tuzzadeen could interfere he
opened the door.

Wild uproar broke out on the instant, men shouted, women screamed and
wailed--in a solid mass they rushed from the spot. Tuzzadeen caught Baker
and ran him back up the passage, the sailors following. They fled for
their lives, slid down the notched log and along the path, pursued by
terrific clamour--but not by human beings apparently. Perceiving this,
Tuzzadeen stopped.

'I go back,' he said breathlessly. 'Them kill us in jungle when them like.
I make trade. You pay?'

'Anything--anything!' cried Baker. 'We haven't even our guns!'

So the Malay went back to negotiate, but they ran on--came to the awful
bridge, Baker foremost. He reached the middle. One of the sailors behind
would wait no longer--advanced and both fell headlong down. The sailor was
killed instantly; Baker, in the middle of the bridge, dropped among the
branches of a tree.

There he lay, bruised, half conscious, until Tuzzadeen's shouts roused
him, and he answered faintly.

'Hold on!' cried the Malay. 'We come good time, Tuan Cap'n! Before dark!'
Six hours to wait at least!

Baker began to stir--found he had no limbs broken, and thought of
descending. His movements were quickened by the onslaught of innumerable
ants, not a venomous species happily. But in climbing down he remarked
that the tree-top was loaded with orchids, which he tore off and dropped;
long before nightfall he met the search-party, toiling up the ravine from
its opening on the shore.

Next day Tuzzadeen returned to bury the dead man and bring away the
orchids; among them was Mr. Vicars' Dendrobium Lowii.

The Dyak practice referred to--of putting the father to bed when a child
is born--prevails, or has prevailed, from China to Peru. It lingers even
in Corsica and the Basque Provinces of Europe. Those who would know more
may consult