Chapter Fifty Five.
Only a Dead-Wood.
Despite the coarse netting of the hammocks on which they were constrained to pass the night, our adventurers slept better than was their wont, from a certain feeling of security,—a confidence that God had not forgotten them. He who could give them food in the forest could also guide them out of the labyrinth into which their own negligence had led them.
A prayer to Him preceded their breakfast on the cream of the cow-tree, and with another they launched themselves upon their strings of shells, with renewed confidence, and proceeded along the curving selvage of the trees. As before, they found their progress impeded by the “ovens” of the piosoca; and despite their utmost exertions, at noon they had made scarce three miles from their starting-point, for the gigantic tree that had sheltered them was full in sight, and even at sunset they could not have been more than six miles from it.
In the forest about them there appeared no resting-place for the night. The trees stood closely together, but without any interlacing of branches, or large horizontal limbs upon which they might seek repose. For a time it appeared as if they would have to spend the night upon the water. This was a grave consideration, and the guide knew it. With their bodies immersed during the midnight hours,—chill even within the tropics,—the consequences might be serious, perhaps fatal. One way or another a lodgement must be obtained among the tree-tops. It was obtained, but after much difficulty. The climbing to it was a severe struggle, and the seat was of the most uncomfortable kind. There was no supper, or comfort of any kind.
With the earliest appearance of day they were all once more in the water, and slowly pursuing their weary way. Now slower than ever, for in proportion to their constantly decreasing strength the obstruction from the piosocas appeared to increase. The lagoon, or at least its border, had become a labyrinth of lilies.
While thus contending against adverse circumstances, an object came under their eyes that caused a temporary abstraction from their misery. Something strange was lying along the water at the distance of about a quarter of a mile from them. It appeared to be some ten or twelve yards in length, and stood quite high above the surface. It was of a dark brown colour, and presented something the appearance of a bank of dried mud, with some pieces of stout stakes projecting upward. Could it be this? Was it a bank or spit of land?
The hearts of the swimmers leaped as this thought, inspired by their wishes, came into every mind. If land, it could be only an islet, for there was water all around it,—that they could perceive. But if so, an islet, if no bigger than a barn-door, would still be land, and therefore welcome. They might stretch their limbs upon it, and obtain a good night’s rest, which they had not done since the wreck of the galatea. Besides an islet ever so small—if only a sand-bar or bank of mud—would be a sort of evidence that the real dry land was not far off.
The dark form at first sight appeared to be close in to the trees, but Munday, standing up in the water, pronounced it to be at some distance from them,—between fifty and a hundred yards. As it was evident that the trees themselves were up to their necks in water, it could hardly be an island. Still there might be some elevated spot, a ridge or mound, that overtopped the inundation. Buoyed up by this hope, the swimmers kept on towards it, every eye scanning intently its outlines in order to make out its real character. All at once the projections which they had taken for stakes disappeared from the supposed spot of mud. They had assumed the shape of large wading birds of dark plumage, which, having spread their long, triangular wings, were now hovering above the heads of the swimmers, by their cries proclaiming that they were more astonished at the latter than they could possibly be at them.
It was not until they had arrived within a hundred yards of the object that its true character was declared. “Pa Terra!” Munday cried, in a sonorous and somewhat sorrowful voice, as he sank despairingly upon his breast;—“no island,—no bank,—no land of any kind. Only a dead-wood!”
“A dead-wood!” repeated the patron, not comprehending what he meant, and fancying from the chagrined air of the Indian that there might be mischief in the thing.
“That’s all, master. The carcass of an old Manguba, that’s been long since stripped of his limbs, and has been carried here upon the current of the Gapo; don’t you see his huge shoulders rising above the water?”
Richard proceeded to explain the Indian’s meaning. “The trunk of a dead tree, uncle. It’s the silk-cotton-tree, or manguba, as Munday calls it. I can tell that by its floating so lightly on the water. It appears to be anchored, though; or perhaps it is moored among the stalks of the piosocas.”
The explanation was interrupted by a shout from the Indian, whose countenance had all at once assumed an expression of cheerfulness,—almost joy. The others, as they turned their eyes upon him, were surprised at the sudden change, for but a moment before they had noticed his despairing look.
“The Mundurucú must be mad, patron,” he shouted. “Where is his head? Gone down to the bottom of the Gapo along with the galatea!”
“What’s the matter?” inquired Tom, brightening up as he beheld the joyful aspect of the Indian. “Is it dhroy land that he sees? I hope it’s that same.”
“What is it, Munday?” asked Trevannion. “Why do you fancy yourself insane?”
“Only to think of it, patron, that I should have been sorry to find but the trunk of a tree. The trunk of a tree,—a grand manguba, big enough to make a montaria, an igarité,—a galatea, if you like,—a great canoe that will carry us all! Cry Santos Dios! Give thanks to the Great Spirit! We are saved!—we are saved!”
The words of the tapuyo, wild as they might appear, were well understood. They were answered by a general shout of satisfaction,—for even the youngest of the party could comprehend that the great log lying near them might be made the means of carrying them clear of the dangers with which they had been so long encompassed.
“True,—true,” said Trevannion. “It is the very thing for which we have been searching in vain,—some sort of timber that would carry its own weight in the water, and us beside. This dead manguba, as you call it, looks as if a ton would not sink it a quarter of an inch. It will certainly serve us for a raft. Give thanks to God, children; his hand is in this. It fills me with hope that we are yet to survive the perils through which we are passing, and that I shall live to see old England once more.”
No flock of jacanas ever created such a commotion among the leaves of the Victoria lily as was made at that moment. Like frail leaves the thick stems were struck aside by the arms of the swimmers, strengthened by the prospect of a speedy delivery from what but the moment before seemed extremest peril; and almost in a moment they were alongside the great trunk of the manguba, in earnest endeavour to get upon it.