a
quick wash of the face he turns out to be quite a useful lad, and plays
a full part in the expedition.

There is the usual Fenn style of apparently mortal perils, overcome by
cunning or luck, and it is quite a good read or listen.

________________________________________________________________________

THROUGH FOREST AND STREAM; OR, THE QUEST OF THE QUETZAL, BY GEORGE
MANVILLE FENN.

CHAPTER ONE.

WHY WE WERE THERE.

The captain of the steamer stopped by where I was watching the flying
fish fizz out of the blue-ink-like water, skim along for some distance,
and drop in again, often, I believe, to be snapped up by some bigger
fish; and he gave me a poke in the shoulder with one finger, so hard,
that it hurt.

"Yes?" I said, for he stood looking hard in my face, while I looked
back harder in his, for it seemed such a peculiar way of addressing one,
and his manner was more curious still.

He was naturally a smooth-faced man with a very browny-yellow skin, and
he kept on passing the finger with which he had poked me over first one
cheek and then over the other, just as if he were shaving himself
without soap.

Then his speech seemed more peculiar than his manner, for he repeated my
one word, only instead of pronouncing it _yes_, he turned it into
_yuss_.

He looked so comic and puzzled that I smiled, and the smile became a
laugh.

I was sorry directly after, because it seemed rude to one who had been
very civil to me ever since we left Kingston Harbour.

"'Tain't nothing to laugh at, young feller," he said, frowning. "I've
been talking to him yonder, and I can't make nothing of him. He's a
_re-lay-tive_ of yours, isn't he?"

"Yes; my uncle," I replied.

"Well, I'm afraid he don't know what he's cut out for himself, and I
think I ought to tell you, so as you may talk to him and bring him to
his senses."

"There's no need," I said, quickly.

"Oh, yes, there is, my lad. He don't know what he's got before him, and
it's right that you should. He's going shooting, isn't he?"

"Yes."

"Nattralist?"

"Yes."

"Well, he don't know what the parts are like where he's going. Do you
know what fevers is?"

"Oh, yes," I replied; "I've heard of them often."

"Well, the coast yonder's where they're made, my lad. Natur's got a big
workshop all along there, and she makes yaller ones, and black ones;
scarlet, too, I dessay, though I never see none there that colour."

"Uncle's a doctor," I said, "