" The dogs ran, and I with
them, and found a large POR-CU-PINE, in the grass. It made a loud
noise, and shot out its quills at the dogs, and made them bleed. At
this Jack shot at the beast, which fell dead on the spot. My wife's
first thought was to dress the wounds made by the quills, which had
stuck in the nose of one of the dogs, while the boys made haste to
pluck some of the quills from the skin of their strange prize.
At last our march came to an end, and I saw for the first time the
great trees that my wife had told me of. They were of vast size, and
were, I thought, fig trees. "If we can but fix our tent up there," I
said, "we shall have no cause to dread, for no wild beasts can reach
us." We sent Frank off to find sticks, with which to make a fire, and
my wife made some soup of the flesh of the beast we had slain, though
we did not like it so well as we did the ham and cheese we brought with
us.
CHAPTER VI.
THE meal at an end, my first thought was to make some steps by means of
which we could reach the first strong branch of the tree. Ernest and I
went in search of some thick canes that grew in the sands hard by.
These we cut down, bound them to four long poles, and thus made a pair
of steps that would, we thought, reach far up the trunk.
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