The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1916-05-22
CContinusd.l

anu DSCAOu1uS lO us to JO1A them III their refuge. We had both seized our magazine rifles and ran out to see what the danger could be- Suddenly from the near belt of trees there broke forth group of twelve or fifteen h. dians, running for their lives, and ai their very heels two of those frightful monsters which had disturbed our camp and pursued me upon my soli tary Journey. In shape they were like horrible toads and moved in success sion of springs, but in size they were of an incredible. bulk, larger than the largest elephant We had never be fore seen them save at night, and in. deed they are nocturnal animals save when disturbed in their lairs, as these had been. We now stood amazed at the sight, for their blotched and warty @kins were of curious, hshlike rides cence, and the sunlight struck them with an ever varying rainbow bloom as they moved. We had little tine to watch them however, for in an instant they had overtaken the fugitiyes and were Inak- ing a dire slaughter among them. Their method was to fall forward with their full weight upon each in turn leaving him, crushed and mangled, to bound on after the others. The wretch 1 were helpless, run as they would, be- fore the relentless purpose and horrf- bIe activity of these monstrous crea- tuEes. One after another they went down, and there were not half dozen surviving by the time my companion md I could come to their help. But our aid was of little avan and only in- volved us in the same peril. At the range of couple of hundred yards we emptied our magazines firing bullet after bullet into the beasts, but with no more effect than if we were pelting them with pellets of paper. Their slow reptiIian natures cared nothing for wounds, and the springs of their lives, with no special brain center, but scat tered throughout their spinal cords, could not I.a tapped hy any modern weapons. The most that we could do was to check their progress by dis tracing their attention with the flash and roar of our guns and so to give both the natives and ourselves time to reach the steps which led to safety But where the conical explosive bulleta Of the twentieth century were of no avail the poisoned arrows of the ma tives. dipped in the juice of strophan- thus and steeped afterward in decayed carr1on, could succeed. Such arrows were of little avail to the hunter who attacked the beast, because their action in that torpid circulation was slow, and before its powers failed it could cer- tainly overtake and s1ay it's assailant. But now, asfthe two monsters bounded us to the very foot of the stairs, a drift of darts came whistling from every chink in the cliff above them. In
 
 and yet, with no sign of pain, they clawed and slabbered with 1mpotent rage at the steps which would lead them to their victims, mounting cfum- silly up for a few yards and then slid ing down again to the ground. But at last the poison worked. One of them gave deep rumbling groan and dropped his huge squat head on to the earth The other bounded around in an eccentric circle, with shrill, wall : ing cries, and then, lying down, writh- ed In agony for some minutes before it also stfnened and lay still. With yells of triumph the Indians came docking down from their caves and danced a frenzied dance of victory around the dead bodies, in mad joy that two more of the most dangerous of all their enc mics had been slain. That night they W eat, for the poison was still active, but lest they should breed a pestilen0c. The great repti1ian hearts, however, each as large as cushion, stiH lay there, beating slowly and steadily, with a gentle rise and fall, in horrible Independent life. It was only upon the third day that the ganglia ran down and the dreadful things were still.
 One fact we had very speedily dis covered-the Indians would do noth- ing to help us to reach the outer world In every other way they were ouI friends-one might almost say our de voted slaEes-but when it was suggest ed that they should help us to make and carry a plank which would bridge the ehasm or when we wished to get from them thongs of leather or nana to weave ropes which might help us we were met by a good humored but all tnvincihIe refusal. They would smile twinkle their eyes. shake their heads and there was the end of it. Even the cid chief met us with the same obsti nate denial, and it was only Maretas the youngster- whom we had saved who looked wistfuIly at us and told us by hi1 gestures that he was grfeyed for our thwarted wishes. Ever since their crowning triumph with the ape men they lookedrupon us as supermen who bore victor- in the tubes of strange weapons, and they believed that SC long as we remained with them good fortune would be theirs. A little red skinned wife and a cave of our owr