d gathered some reeds, and set to work to plait us hats.
Leaving him with Lucien, Sumichrast and I went off in quest of game. On
our return from an unproductive ramble, I saw that my son was already
wearing a funnel-shaped head covering. L'Encuerado offered me a similar
one, which, as my friend remarked, gave me the look of a Chinese. After
having rested a short time, I thought about again looking for game; but
the uproar of the torrent seemed to have frightened away all animal
life.

This second ramble quite exhausted us, without producing any prey but a
tanager, far too small to afford food for so many. L'Encuerado and
Lucien, both out in the midst of the swamp, perceived us approaching.
The young gentleman came running towards us, holding his newly-made hat
in his hand; but, in his haste, he forgot that the bed of a marsh is
almost always slippery, and he fell flat on his face among some aquatic
plants. In one leap the Indian was close to him, and soon picked him up;
but, instead of complaining of his fall, Lucien looked up at the Indian
with a troubled face. The fact was, his hat held some fish he had caught
with his insect-net, and at least a third of them had disappeared from
his disaster.

"Oh dear! oh dear!" cried Sumichrast, who could not help smiling at the
piteous face of the young fisherman; "most decidedly, we are all
unfortunate."

This joke was taken in a serious light by l'Encuerado, who smote his
forehead as if suddenly struck by some idea.

"It is the genius of the cave!" he cried. "Ah! the scoundrel, after all
he owes me, and the precautions I took!"

"What precautions?" asked Lucien, surprised.

"I picked up seven white pebbles, and drew out a beautiful cross."

"What did the cross matter to him?"

"Matter to him! why, Chanito, he knows well that we are Christians, and
yet he bewitches us. Wait a bit, I'll match him."

And rearing himself up against the trunk of a tree, standing on his
head, with his legs in the air, l'Encuerado kicked about with all the
frenzy of one possessed. He fell sometimes to the right, and sometimes
to the left, but raised himself after every fall, and resumed his
clown-like attitude. Not one of us could keep a serious countenance
while looking at his contortions. Lucien laughed till he cried,
especially because the Indian, as if on purpose to render the scene more
comical, accompanied his gestures with invectives against the genius of
the cave and invocations to S