Grimly they watched as the airship sailed over the hill.  Then suddenly there came into view a collection of mud huts on a vast plain, surrounded by dense jungle on every side.  As the travelers looked, they could see little creatures running wildly about.  Even without a glass it could be noted that their bodies were covered with a curious growth of thick sandy hair.

“The red pygmies!” cried Tom.  “Now for the rescue!”

Eagerly Tomba indicated the hut where his master and mistress were held.  Telling his friends to have their weapons in readiness, Tom steered the airship toward the rude shelter whence he hoped to take the missionaries.  Down to the ground swiftly shot the Black Hawk.  Tom checked her with a quick movement of the deflecting rudder, and she landed gently on the wheels.

“Mr. Illingway!  Mrs. Illingway!  We have come to rescue you!” yelled the young inventor, as he stepped out on the deck, with his electric rifle in his hand.  “Where are you?  Can you come out?”

The door of the hut was burst open, and a white man and woman, recognizable as such, even in the rude skins that clothed them, rushed out.  Wonder spread over their faces as they saw the great airship.  They dropped on their knees.

The next instant a swarm of savage little red men surrounded them, and rudely bore them, strugglingly, back into the hut.

“Come on!” cried Tom, about to leap to the ground.  “It’s now or never!  We must save them!”

Mr. Durban pulled him back, and pointed to a horde of the red-haired savages rushing toward the airship.  “They’d tear you to pieces in a minute!” cried the old hunter.  “We must fight them from the ship.”

There was a curious whistling sound in the air.  Mr. Durban looked up.

“Duck, everybody!” he yelled.  “They’re firing arrows at us!  Get under shelter, for they may be poisoned!”

Tom and the others darted into the craft.  The arrows rattled on deck in a shower, and hundreds of the red imps were rushing up to give battle.  Inside the hut where the missionaries were, it was now quiet.  Tom Swift wondered if they still lived.

“Give ’em as good as they send!” cried Mr. Durban.  “We will have to fire at them now.  Open up with your electric rifle, Tom!”

As he spoke the elephant hunter fired into the midst of the screaming savages.  The battle had begun.

CHAPTER XXI

DRIVEN BACK

What the travelers had heard regarding the fierceness and courage of the red pygmies had not been one bit exaggerated.  Never had such desperate fighting ever taken place.  The red dwarfs, scarcely one of whom was more than three feet high, were strongly built, and there were so many of them, and they battled together with such singleness of purpose, that they were more formidable than a tribe of ordinary-sized savages would have been.