“Well, this is fierce!” exclaimed Tom, at the end of the first day when, tired and weary, bitten by insects, and torn by jungle briars, they made camp that night.

“Going to give up?” asked Ned.

“Not much!”

They felt better after supper, and, tethering the animals securely, they stretched out in their tents, with mosquito canopies over them to keep away the pestering insects.

“I’ve got a new scheme,” announced Tom next morning at breakfast.

“What is it?  Going on the rest of the way in the aeroplane?” asked Ned hopefully.

“No, though I believe if I had brought the big airship along I could have used it.  But I mean about driving the animals.  I’m going to make a long line of them, tying one to the other like the elephants in the circus when they march around, holding each other’s tails.  Then one of us will ride in front, another in the rear, and one on each side.  In that way we’ll keep them going and they won’t stray off.”

“Bless my button hook!” cried Mr. Damon.  “That’s a good idea, Tom!” It was carried out with much success, and thereafter they traveled better.

But even at the best it was not easy work, and more than once Tom’s friends urged him to turn back.  But he would not, ever pressing on, with the strange land for his goal.  They had long since passed the last of the native villages, and they had to depend on their own efforts for food.  Fortunately they did not have any lack of game, and they fared well with what they had with them in the packs.

Occasionally they met little bands of native hunters, and, though usually these men fled at the sight of our friends, yet once they managed to make signs to one, who, informed them as best he could, that giant land was still far ahead of them.

Twice they heard distant sounds of native battles and the weird noise of the wooden drums and the tom-toms.  Once, as they climbed up a big hill, they looked down into a valley and saw a great conflict in which there must have been several thousand natives on either side.  It was a fierce battle, seen even from afar, and Tom and the others shuddered as they slipped down over the other side of the rise, and out of sight.

“We’d better steer clear of them,” was Tom’s opinion; and the others agreed with him.

For another week they kept on, the way becoming more and more difficult, and the country more and more wild.  They had fairly to cut their way through the jungle at times, and the only paths were animal trails, but they were better than nothing.  For the last five days they had not seen a human being, and the loneliness was telling on them.

“I’d be glad to see even a two-headed giant,” remarked Tom whimsically one night as they made their camp.

“Yes, and I’d be glad to hear someone talk, even in the sign language,” added Ned, with a grin.

They slept well, for they were very tired, and Tom, who shared his tent with Ned, was awakened rather early the next morning by hearing someone moving outside the canvas shelter.