Peck's Bad Boy in an airship

by George W. Peck

The Boy’s Pa Shows Bravery in the Jungles in Africa—Four Gorillas Chase Pa—The Boy and His Pa Don’t Sleep Much at Night—The Boy Discovers a Marsh Full of Wild Buffaloes.

I do not know whether Pa is an expert in hypnotism or what it is, but he certainly delivers the goods when he goes after a wild animal in the jungles of Africa, and he shows bravery at times that astonishes everybody, but he admits that he is a coward at heart, and would run if anybody pulled a gun on him, and I guess he would, but you turn him loose in a wild animal congress and he will be speaker and make the whole bunch get on their knees.

I was scared when Pa wanted to have a cage with iron bars hauled into the jungle where the gorillas live, and insisted that he be left there alone for two days, with rations to last a week, as he said he expected to have some gorilla boarders to feed, but Mr. Hagenbach let Pa have his way, and the cage was hauled about eight miles into the black wilderness, with great trees and vines and suckes and gorillas all around him, but Pa insisted on having a phonograph full of jig tunes, and when we got the cage located and Pa in it and were ready to leave, I cried, and the whole crowd felt as though we would never see Pa alive again, and it was a sad parting.

When we left Pa he was cooking some bacon on an oil stove in the cage and frying some eggs for his dinner, and as we took the trail back to camp, in silence, we could smell the bacon frying, and when we got a mile or so away we heard music and stopped to listen and could plainly hear the phonograph playing “There will be a hot time,” and Mr. Hagenbach said it reminded him of a dirge.

It was a long two days before we could go back and find Pa’s remains, but the second day we hiked out through the jungle and into the woods. Pa had told us that when we came after him to come quiet and not disturb the menagerie, so when we got near the place where we left Pa we slowed down and crept up silently and peeked through the bushes and a sight met our eyes that scared me.

There were four big gorillas and several little ones around the cage, and some were gnawing ham bones and others were eating dog biscuits, but it was so silent in the cage that I thought Pa had been killed and that the gorillas were eating him, so I yelled, “Pa, are you all right?” and he answered back, “You bet your sweet life I am all right,” and then we prepared to go the cage, when Pa said for us to climb trees, and just then the gorillas started for us with their teeth gleaming, and we all shinned up the trees around the cage, and we had front seats at the biggest show on earth. Pa told us that the gorillas that treed us were afraid we were going to harm him, and they proposed to protect him.

He said he had been feeding the animals for two days and had got their confidence so he could make them understand what he wanted them to do.

“Now watch ’em dance when I turn on the music,” and then Pa gave them the “Merry Widow” waltz, and by gosh if a big gorilla didn’t put his arm around his wife, or some other gorilla’s wife, and dance barefooted right there in front of the cage, and all the rest joined in, and the baby gorillas rolled over on the ground and laughed like hyenas. Pa stopped the music and called one big gorilla Rastus and told him to sit down in the cactus, and the others did the same, and Pa repeated an old democratic speech of his, and they clapped their hands just like a caucus. “Well, what do you know about that already,” said Mr. Hagenbach, and then he asked Pa how he was going to capture them.

Pa Stopped the Music and Repeated an Old Democratic Speech of His and They Acted Just Like a Caucus.