By the time they had covered the three hundred yards and reached the next platform, they were finding their “tree-legs.”

They stopped a while to take their bearings, looking out on the same unbroken expanse of tree-tops, tossed up into all manner of inequalities, and then recommenced their acrobatic, performance, making for the next “station.”  With a few slips, a few scratches, and bruised shins, they kept on until they had covered about a mile, when the growing dusk warned them to form camp.

“We’d better go down below,” said Mr. Hume.

“Not I,” said Venning.  “I had enough of down below last night; I’m going to sleep on deck, sir.”

“Ditto,” said Compton, emphatically; “and I don’t see why we all should not camp out aloft.  We could easily widen the platform, rig up the waterproof sheets as a tent, and haul up some mould to make a fireplace.”

The idea was acted upon vigorously, the platform widened and strengthened, the roof pitched, the mould hauled up in a bag made out of one of the leopard skins, and the fire lit upon a foundation so made.  They roosted high and secure, but they could not claim in the morning that they had passed a pleasant night, for the bed was hard, the space cramped, and each one dreamt he was falling off a tremendously high perch.  Moreover, sound travelled more freely up above, and, in place of the brooding silence of the under-world, there were many strange noises up aloft, the most menacing being an occasional booming roar, which they recognized as the cry of the gorilla.

The morning was wet as usual, and heavy clouds trailed over the forest like a leaden mist on the sea.  They crouched under the tent, listening to the drip, drip, drip, and filling their water-bottles from the tricklings.  About ten the clouds lifted, and then the sun drove his arrows through until, almost in a twinkling, the great wet blanket rolled itself up and vanished swiftly into the horizon, leaving behind the sparkling of myriad raindrops on the leaves.  Then for an hour the forest steamed, as the sun licked the drops off the roof and chased the moisture along the boughs.  When the way was dried for them, they went on, going barefooted this time, for the better grip to be obtained.

Other creatures had waited for the drying of the leaves beside themselves, and whenever they passed the white-grey branches of a wild fig tree, they were treated to a scolding from green parrots on the feed, and heard frequently the clapping report of the wood-pigeons as they brought their wings together, and the harsh cry of the toucans.  Oh yes, there was life and there was death.

Venning, going on ahead, saw below him in the fork of a tree the face of a monkey, with the eyes closed as if in sleep.  He stopped to look, stooping his head, and his eyes caught a slight movement.  Then he saw that the sleeping monkey was cradled in the coils of a python resting in the forks of the tree, its head raised a little, and its tail gripping a branch.  The head of the monkey rested peacefully on one of the black and yellow coils, for death had come upon it swiftly.