nd feared the human
beings who leaped and screamed and smote from among the fires. But
still more they seemed to fear some unknown thing behind them. For a
time, however, the crackling flames and the biting shafts proved a
sufficient barrier, and the motley but terrifying invaders went
sheering off irresolutely to westward over the downs.

Down by the edge of the tide the raft-builders worked under Grom's
guidance. The broad water--some four or five miles across--was the
tidal estuary of a great river which flowed out of the north-west. Its
brimming current bore down from the interior jungles the trunks of
many uprooted trees, which the tides of the estuary hurled back and
strewed along the beach. The raft-builders, therefore, had plenty of
material to work with. And the fear that lay chill upon their hearts
urged them to a diligence that was far from their habit.

It was rather like working in a nightmare. From time to time would
come a rush, a stampede, of deer or tapirs, along the strip of beach
between the water and the cliff. The toiling men would draw aside till
the rabble went by, then fall to work again.

Once, however, it was a herd of wild cattle, snorting, and tossing
their wide, keen-pointed horns; and their trampling onrush filled the
whole space so that the men had to plunge out into deep water to
escape. Several, afraid of the big-mouthed, flesh-eating fish which
infested the estuary at high tide, stayed too close in shore, and paid
for their irresolution by being gored savagely.

It was about the full of the moon and the time of the longest days,
and the raft-builders toiled feverishly the whole night through. By
sunrise Bawr and Grom estimated that there were rafts enough to carry
the whole tribe, provided the present calm held on. They decided,
however, to construct several more, in case some should prove less
buoyant than they hoped.

But for this most wise provision Fate refused to grant the time.

A naked slip of a girl, her one scant garment of leopard skin caught
upon a rock and twitched from off her loins as she ran, came fleeing
down the hill-path, her hair afloat upon the fresh morning air.
Straggling far behind her came a crowd of children, and old women
carrying babies or bundles of dried meat.

"They must not come yet. They'll be in the way!" cried Bawr angrily,
waving them back. But they paid no attention--which showed that there
was something they feared more even than the iron-fis