Ha—ha—ha!
Wauck!
Chuckle—chuckle—chuckle! A regular gurgle in a hoarse throat.
“I won’t stand it. You come on,” cried Billy, seizing Mark by the hand. “This way.”
Mark did not resist, and the little sailor hurried him along as fast as the nature of the ground would allow; and with the full intention of going right towards where they had left the others, at the end of the bitumen river, he went right in the opposite direction, and farther and farther into the wildest recesses of the jungle.
Chapter Thirty Eight.
How Mark and Billy found a strange Bed.
For a good half-hour they toiled on through cane-woven thickets, in and out of wildernesses of huge tree-trunks, many of which had great flat buttresses all round, which were difficult to climb over or round, while other trees seemed to be growing with their roots all above ground, green, snaky, twisted and involved roots, that necessitated sheer climbing before they could get by. Now and then they came to an opening where the trees had been burned down by volcanic fires, and here all was light and beauty in the evening sunshine. Again rocky crevices ran through the forest, giving them terribly hard work to get over, perhaps to come at once upon some boiling spring, whose water, where it trickled away and cooled, was of a filthy bitter taste that was most objectionable. Then again there were blistering pools of mud ever rising in a high ebullition, and bursting with strange sounds.