ion of the race. So long as
the others took their toll, that generation was safe.

Crocodiles too were bursting through their tough, leathery egg-shells,
but in smaller numbers. They were vicious little creatures right from
the start, snapping quickly and savagely at everything that interfered
with their rapid march to the muddy stream. But they too had their
enemies and numbers did not live to reach the water's edge, in spite of
the fact that the mother caiman had the unpleasant habit of keeping a
watchful eye on her nest and escorting her brood to safety if she
chanced to be present when it came into the world. If an overzealous
jabirou stork or a gluttonous opossum ventured near she charged with a
hoarse bellow that put the intruder to flight; and while she was thus
engaged, some other keen-visaged marauder would be sure to take
advantage of the opening created by her absence to satisfy his rapacious
cravings.

But the turtles and the crocodiles were not the only delicacies the
sandbars provided. There were iguanas two yards long, and on the knolls
where the wind had blown the sand into heaps fat young skimmers and
terns were testing their wings for the new life that lay before them in
the air.

The shallow inlets were full of fish. They came out of the deeper water
at night to spawn, and could be dragged ashore with little effort.

From such a well-stocked hunting ground Suma was not eager to depart.
Day after day the journey was postponed, and the procrastination, as
usual, brought evil consequences.

It was night, but a full moon, and the myriads of stars, beaming and
twinkling in the glorious tropical sky, shed a mellow light on the
sandbar where the last of the turtles were escaping from their prison
shells. Suma feasted leisurely, then drank from the lazy stream, and sat
straight upright like a huge cat and began unconcernedly to tidy up by
licking her huge paws with her pink tongue and then applying them to her
face.

A dull roar pierced the silence with a suddenness that was ominous. The
Jaguar sprang to her feet and uneasily tested the air, first in one
direction, then another. There was not a stir of wind. The sky was
cloudless--the growing rumble was not thunder.

Onward came the mysterious sound with a terrifying swiftness, and Suma
knew it must be the river. The abrupt bank was fully half a mile distant
but toward it the startled creature bounded in gigantic leaps that took
her over the sand wit