As soon as possible Philip shut the cupboard-door; but it was a case of “locking the stable after the horse had been stolen,” and he looked around with dismay as he saw each of his long-tailed companions holding a bottle to his mouth, evidently wondering how the stupid man could have found so much satisfaction in what was to them very dry fun.
The fact that they did not know enough to draw the corks caused him to hope none of the party would succeed in getting any liquor; but in this he was speedily disappointed.
It was one of Goliah’s advisers who, after watching Philip stealthily, had begun the rush for the bottles, and this old fellow knew exactly how their prisoner had set about extracting the contents.
The aged ape struck off the head of the bottle with a potato-masher which was on the table, and five minutes later the floor was strewn with broken glass, while every animal in the room except Goliah was busily engaged in making himself more brutish than nature intended.
Philip stood gazing at this apparently convivial company with dismay written on every feature of his countenance. If sober apes were disagreeable companions, what would be the result when he was surrounded by three or four hundred drunken animals? There could be no question but that they would be intoxicated when each had finished his bottle, and then the position of the captive, already disagreeable, must necessarily be increased a hundred-fold.
It was probably the silence of the feasters which aroused Goliah from his ginger-dream. He withdrew his head, plentifully besmeared with the saccharine liquid, to gaze stupidly about him, while pieces of the preserves hung from his nose, ears and eyebrows in the most picturesque fashion. Gorged though he was, the sweet repast did not suffice when his followers had something different, and with one bound he leaped upon the smallest monkey-toper. To choke the astonished little reveler and wrest his bottle from him was but the work of a moment, and then the king of the island began his vinous portion of the feast.
Now, as if he had not already done himself sufficient injury, Philip speedily set the example of a yet more alarming phase in this monkey orgy.
Angry because of what he had unwittingly done he dashed his empty bottle against the cupboard-door.
This example was contagious. In another instant every ape was busily engaged in belaboring his companions with bottles, and fragments of glass flew in all directions.
Now, more than ever, was it difficult to leave the apartment. The hailstorm of glass was so thick as almost to obscure the vision, and Philip crouched behind the cooking-stove to protect himself from the flying particles.