erstood at once what had happened.

"Tsetse!" he said, addressing Stas. "They must die."

Stas also understood, for while in Port Said he had often heard of the
African fly, called "tsetse," which is such a terrible plague in some
regions that wherever it has its permanent habitat the negroes do not
possess any cattle at all, and wherever, as a result of temporary
favorable conditions it multiplies unexpectedly, cattle perish. A
horse, ox, or donkey bitten by a tsetse wastes and dies in the course
of a fortnight or even in a few days. The local animals understand the
danger which threatens them, for it happens that whole herds of oxen,
when they hear its hum near a waterfall, are thrown into a wild
stampede and scamper in all directions.

Stas' horses were bitten; these horses and the donkey Kali now rubbed
daily with some kind of plant, the odor of which resembled that of
onions and which he found in the jungles. He said that the odor would
drive away the tsetse, but notwithstanding this preventative remedy the
horses grew thinner. Stas, with dread, thought of what might happen if
all the animals should succumb; how then could he convey Nell, the
saddle-cloth, the tent, the cartridges and the utensils? There was so
much of them that only the King could carry them all. But to liberate
the King it was necessary to sacrifice at least two-thirds of the
cartridges.

Ever-increasing troubles gathered over Stas' head like the clouds which
did not cease to water the jungle with rain. Finally came the greatest
calamity, in the presence of which all the others dwindled--fever!

IX

One night at supper Nell, having raised a piece of smoked meat to her
lips, suddenly pushed it away, as if with loathing, and said:

"I cannot eat to-day."

Stas, who had learned from Kali where the bees were and had smoked them
out daily in order to get their honey, was certain that the little one
had eaten during the day too much honey, and for that reason he did not
pay any attention to her lack of appetite. But she after a while rose
and began to walk hurriedly about the camp-fire describing an ever
larger circle.

"Do not get away too far, for something might seize you," the boy
shouted at her.

He really, however, did not fear anything, for the elephant's presence,
which the wild animals scented, and his trumpeting, which reached their
vigilant ears, held them at a respectable distance. It assured safety
alike to the people and