r than he, and of nearly the same height.

"Do any of you speak English?" asked the Doctor, addressing them
directly.

Evidently they did not, for they answered only by shaking their heads
and by more smiles.

Then one of them spoke. "The Master welcomes his friends," he said. And
all the others repeated it after him, like children in school repeating
proudly a lesson newly learned.

The Doctor and his two friends laughed heartily, and, completely
reassured by this exhibition of their friendliness, they signified to
Lao that they were ready again to go forward.

As they walked onward through the apparently endless and unchanging
forest, surrounded by what the Very Young Man called their "guard of
honor," they were joined from time to time by other Oroid men, all of
whom seemed to know who they were and where they were going, and who
fell silently into line with them. Within an hour their party numbered
twenty or more.

Seeing one of the natives stop a moment and snatch some berries from one
of the vines with which many of the trees were encumbered, the Very
Young Man did the same. He found the berries sweet and palatable, and he
ate a quantity. Then discovering he was hungry, he took some crackers
from his belt and ate them walking along. The Doctor and the Big
Business Man ate also, for although they had not realized it, all three
were actually famished.

Shortly after this the party came to a broad, smooth-flowing river, its
banks lined with rushes, with here and there a little spot of gray,
sandy beach. It was apparent from Lao's signs that they must wait at
this point for a boat to take them across. This they were glad enough to
do, for all three had gone nearly to the limit of their strength. They
drank deep of the pure river water, laved their aching limbs in it
gratefully, and lay down, caring not a bit how long they were forced to
wait.

In perhaps another hour the boat appeared. It came from down the river,
propelled close inshore by two members of their own party who had gone
to fetch it. At first the travelers thought it a long, oblong raft. Then
as it came closer they could see it was constructed of three canoes,
each about thirty feet long, hollowed out of tree-trunks. Over these was
laid a platform of small trees hewn roughly into boards. The boat was
propelled by long, slender poles in the hands of the two men, who, one
on each side, dug them into the bed of the river and walked with them
the l