ook, there they go, close after one another. It
looks just like some great reptile, but you can see now. They're afraid
of the boat."

He had hardly spoken when the latter quivered from the effects of a
sudden concussion.

"Take care," said Sir Humphrey. "You've run upon a sunken trunk."

"No, sir," said the man in the bows, as he held on to a tree with the
boat-hook; "that wasn't our doing. It was one of they alligators gave
us a slap with his tail. Look at the water. There he goes."

The man was right enough, for the water was eddying violently from the
passage of something beneath, and proof was given directly after, by the
appearance of a dark gnarled something a few inches above the surface,
this something curving over and being in the act of disappearing, when,
carried away by the excitement of the moment, Brace raised his double
gun, took a quick aim, and fired, with the result that there was a
tremendous splash, the appearance of a flattened tail for a moment, and
amidst a discordant screaming from overhead, the occupants of the boat
had a glimpse of what seemed to be a writhing hank of enormously thick
chocolate and tawny-yellow cable, which seemed to have been thrown from
above, to fall with another splash into the water some twenty yards in
front of where the boat lay. Then there was a momentary gleam of colour
as the object writhed and twined, and then the muddy water rose and fell
and washed among the trunks which rose straight from the surface, while
for a few moments no one spoke, but every eye was directed at the spot
where the water quivered as if something was in motion beneath.

"I fired at the alligator," said Brace, turning to his brother with a
half-startled look.

"Yes, and scared that big snake," said Briscoe. "He was having a nap
tied up in a knot on some big branch. I've seen 'em sometimes hanging
over the side in thick folds. You tumbled him over with the startling.
Warning to him to take a turn round the branch with his tail."

"Be ready to fire," said Brace hurriedly. "It is sure to come up again
to try and creep into a tree."

"No," said Briscoe quietly. "He won't show himself again for hours."

"Nonsense," said Brace impatiently; "it would be drowned."

Briscoe smiled good-humouredly.

"Drowned?" he said. "Just about as much as an eel would. Nice place
this for a bathe, what with the alligators and the anacondas. Not much
chance for a man if one of those brutes t