enaced the explorers was more frightful than any that
they had been called upon to face since entering that mysterious land
known by the name of the Matto Grosso.

The Aryks numbered more than half a hundred, all active, vigilant and
armed with their fearful poisoned javelins. They had taken position
among the trees on the western bank of the Xingu, at the base of the
rapids, at the very point where the white men intended to shoulder
their canoe and make their last portage.

Instead of being in the open, where they were in plain sight of the
defenders, and fair targets for their unerring Winchesters, they were
stationed behind the numerous trunks or lying on the ground, where
little could be seen of them except their bushy heads and gleaming
black eyes, as they glared with inextinguishable hate at the white men
who had slain so many of their number.

The suspicious Long was looking in the direction, with the thought that
if any ambush was attempted, that would be the very spot, when he
caught sight of a dusky figure, as it whisked from behind a narrow
trunk to another that afforded better cover.

That hasty glance in the dim morning light revealed an alarming number
of heads glaring around the trees and from among the undergrowth like
so many wild beasts, aflame with fury and the exultation of savages who
knew that their enemies were at last forced inextricably into their
grasp.

So assured were the Aryks in fact that they showed a disposition to toy
for a moment with their victims, as a cat does with a mouse before
craunching it in her jaws. They brandished their weapons, danced
grotesquely and uttered shrill shrieks audible above the deafening roar
of the angry Xingu as it foamed through the rapids.

It was a fearful trap in which our friends found themselves, for it was
impossible to advance or retreat, and it was madness to hope that they
could again escape the shower of spears that were already poised in the
air and ready to be launched.

Bippo and Pedros, with wild shrieks of terror bounded into the canoe,
and wrapping the blankets around them, cowered in abject helpless dread
of impending death. They were only an incumbrance, as they had proven
in more than one crisis before.

But not one of the Caucasians showed the white feather. Disdaining to
seek impossible shelter, they coolly prepared to die fighting, while
exposed to the hurtling javelins, whose appalling effectiveness they
knew too well.