But Stukely was thoroughly accustomed to these and the various other strange sounds that so frequently broke the silence of the forest, and if he noted them at all it was merely as a hunter notes sounds that guide him toward his game, or warns him of possible dangers. It was not, however, in such a spot as this that he expected to find game, it was in the open glades that occur here and there, where for some unaccountable reason an acre or so of ground is entirely free from trees, or at all events from undergrowth, and where the soil is covered with thick, rich grass, upon which the deer love to graze, and which they seem capable of scenting for miles. So he pushed forward, worming his way through the tangled brake with an ease and celerity that would have seemed absolutely miraculous to him three months earlier, and ever, as he went, his glances darted hither and thither, searching for the stronger light which should reveal to him the whereabout of one of those open glades, or, incidentally, a venomous snake or other noxious creature lurking in his path.
At length, when he had been thus engaged for about an hour, and had travelled a distance of about two miles, a somewhat stronger light away on his right front conveyed to him the welcome intimation that such an open glade as he sought was at hand; and ten minutes later he emerged from the forest to find himself confronted by a scene of so extraordinary a character that he halted abruptly and rubbed his eyes, uncertain for the moment whether what he beheld was reality or the effect of a disordered imagination.
Chapter Eleven.
How Phil encountered a most marvellous Adventure.
The place in which Stukely now found himself was a perfectly open glade of about forty acres in extent, carpeted with rich, luscious grass, such as the antelope loves to feed upon, without a tree or shrub of any kind upon it. It was not this, however, which excited his astonishment, for such glades were by no means uncommon even in the densest parts of the South American forest; nor was it that, immediately facing him, on the opposite side of the glade, towered a bare, vertical stretch of porphyry cliff towering up full three hundred feet into the cloudless blue. But it was the unique spectacle which the face of that cliff afforded that excited the Englishman’s admiration and astonishment, for it was sculptured all over, from base to summit, with boldly executed figures of men, women, and animals, which, when his admiration had passed sufficiently to enable him to study them in detail, seemed to Stukely to tell some sort of a story. But what the story was he was quite unable to puzzle out, for there were hunting episodes depicted, and also scenes which seemed to represent some sort of religious ceremonial, while others, again, might be interpreted as representing either a human sacrifice, or, possibly, the execution of a criminal; for they represented a group of men thrusting forward by a long pole another, whose hands were bound behind him, toward a great uncouth-looking monster that was emerging from a pool and advancing ponderously toward the unwilling victim with widely opened, cavernous jaws thickly set with most formidable-looking teeth. The figures were executed in rather high relief, and there was a certain quaintness and stiffness of outline in their delineation that marked them as the work of an untutored artist, yet the action of them was depicted with a spirit and vigour which proved that the sculptor, although untutored, was undoubtedly a keen student of nature. Altogether, it was by far the most surprising thing of its kind that Stukely had ever seen, and he stood for a long time studying the various tableaux, and wondering why in the world anyone should have thought it worth while to spend the best part of a lifetime in carving in the stubborn rock so elaborate a series of pictures, where probably no one but an occasional wandering Indian would ever behold them.
Somewhat to Stukely’s surprise, there was no game in the glade, yet it was the one place of all others where he would have expected to find antelope at least. He looked about him to see whether he could discover a cause for the emptiness of the glade, and presently thought he had found it in a cave, the opening of which in the face of the opposite cliff he had already curiously noted while examining the sculptures. Doubtless that was it; a panther or some other evil beast had made its home in the cave, and had preyed upon the game that frequented the glade until it had all been frightened away. He decided to go across and investigate the place; possibly the panther, or whatever it was, might be at home, and, if so, its skin would be very useful, for his clothes were becoming much the worse for wear.
So he walked across the glade, and presently noticed, as he drew near the mouth of the cave, that the soil round about it was damp, and that a small trickle of water was issuing from the opening. By the time that he had advanced a few steps farther he had also noticed that the grass immediately about the entrance of the cave was very nearly all worn away, as though by the feet of many animals, while the damp soil about the opening was trodden into the consistency of thick mud that bore the impress of the feet of many animals, among which he recognised those of antelope, wild pig, monkeys, and a jaguar or two. These last confirmed his theory as to the reason why the glade presented such an utterly forsaken appearance; a pair of jaguars, knowing by instinct that such a spot would be largely frequented by various kinds of game, had no doubt taken up their quarters in the cave, and had fared sumptuously every day until their repeated attacks had driven the game away.
Stringing his bow and drawing an arrow from his quiver, Stukely strode forward until he stood in the mouth of the cave, when he halted and looked in. He now saw that it was a very much larger place than he had at first imagined it to be; for, looking inward, he was able to follow the rough walls for a few yards, as they receded inward, when he lost sight of them in the gloom. Also he became aware of a curious charnel-house kind of stench that now and then issued from the cavern. It was just the kind of odour that one would expect to meet with in the den of a carnivorous beast, and Phil peered keenly into the darkness, more than half-expecting to see the shining eyes of a jaguar or puma glaring at him when his own eyes had become accustomed to the subdued light of the place. But no such sight greeted him, only, as he stood, staring and listening, a sudden faint splash of water reached his ears from within the dark depths of the cavern, and a few seconds later, as a little stream of water came trickling down the slope from the interior, a hot, strong puff of the peculiar effluvium which he had previously noticed, smote him and almost turned him sick.