The weather was delightfully fine and water plentiful. In this country there is very little difference in the seasons, save that one part of the year is wet and the remainder dry. The rain comes from the north-west, and during the dry months the wind blows from the exactly opposite direction, namely, the south-east.
CHAPTER III.
The Head on the Rock—A strange People—We are made Welcome—King Quibibio.
IT was early one morning that we suddenly came to a Rock on which we both caught sight, at the same time, of a rude carving of a man’s head. Much startled, for it was the first sign of human occupation we had seen for some time, we examined it carefully; and we both were struck by observing that this head was not a copy of the natives of the country we had passed through. For these Indians are all most ugly, having blubber lips, flat noses, and low foreheads; but this head was that of a handsome man although without any beard. It was carved in the perpendicular face of the Rock, and the countenance bore a somewhat severe expression; in fact, after such a long and rude separation from any of our kind, both Paul and I felt somewhat awed as we gazed at it.
The Rock bore no other mark nor inscription save this solemn, life-sized head. It was almost on the crest of a rise, and no sooner had we passed it, than we came on to a beaten pathway on which were fresh footmarks, not naked like an Indian’s, but more resembling those of a boot without heels.
I confess that this sudden coming upon the fresh traces of a civilized race so unmanned both of us that we felt a strong inclination to beat a hasty retreat. For you must remember that we had now been about four years living either with savages or by ourselves in a wilderness.
“Shall we follow the path?” I whispered to Paul, for I felt afraid to speak loud.
He looked around and then answered in the same low tone:
“Let us look over the ridge.”
I nodded assent, and carefully and cautiously we advanced to the top. Hiding behind a heap of rocks we looked over.