“Well,” said the doctor, “it doesn’t seem as if they are dissatisfied with my treatment.”
“No,” replied Mark, laughing; “and they seem ready enough to pay your fees.”
“Yes, and I must make haste and get our little friend well, which he soon will be, for Nature will do the rest; but I don’t suppose we shall see any more of them, for people of such a low grade of civilisation would probably soon forget. But we must get on. I want to discover Captain Lawton’s ancient city.”
“Yes, I want to see that,” cried Dean. “One doesn’t want to be always hunting and shooting.”
“That’s right, Dean. The sooner we are off the better. Oh, here comes Mak. Let’s stir him up again about where the big stones are.”
“He will only point with his spear at the forest as if they were there,” said Mark, “and of course we can’t drive the bullocks through.”
“No,” said Dean; “but he may mean that the old ruins are on the other side.”
“Yes,” said the doctor, “and that we can go round, for we are evidently skirting the edge of this primaeval jungle.”
“Skirting the edge!” said Mark, laughing. “Oh, yes—like skirting the edge of the world, and we shall be coming out some day—some year, I mean, right on the other side of America. I don’t believe there are any old stones. It’s all what-you-may-call-it.”
“All what-you-may-call-it, you young sceptic!” said the doctor, laughing. “Well, what do you call it, for I don’t know?”