At length after what seemed endless hours of paddling and chanting the river took an abrupt turn and the boys found themselves at the foot of a steep cliff that towered up, it seemed, for six hundred feet at least. It was formed of black basalt and was crowned with a fringe of contrasting vegetation, but the most remarkable thing about it was that its surface was literally honeycombed with small holes from which, as the canoe cortege drew up, innumerable heads were poked.
An astonishing thing, however, about the men who scrutinized the lads from their lofty watch-towers, was that they were several degrees lighter in complexion than the boatmen and almost as white as the boys in fact. Their features, too, were different. As the boys looked in wonderment at this extraordinary dwelling-place and its equally strange inhabitants, Billy gave an excited shout:
"Great jumping horn-toads, look at that!"
One of the light-colored men had emerged from his, hole and with as little concern as if he were taking a walk had suddenly launched himself into space. But instead of falling to the ground or into the river, as the boys had fully expected to see him do, he floated gracefully to the opposite bank of the river with as little effort as a settling bird.
"Good land of hot-cakes, Lathrop, do you realize where we are?" almost shrieked the excited Billy.
"In the village of the Flying Men," stammered Lathrop, as, one after another, the inhabitants of the rock holes dropped from their aeries and floated groundwards. As the boys watched they saw distinctly that each man, from his wrist to his side, was possessed of a sort of leathery fiber like that of bat's swing, and that as their arms were of unusual length this fiber supported them in their downward flights like a parachute.
"I'll never call any one a liar again as long as I live," choked out Billy, as one after another these strange beings gathered in a chattering group on the river bank.
"But they can't fly upward," exclaimed Lathrop, pointing eagerly to where some of the gliders, having swum the river, were nimbly clambering up a grass rope-ladder to their homes.
"Oh, gee! if I only had a camera," groaned Billy.
"It will be no use telling anyone about this even if we do get out of here, they'll say that we have had a rarebit dream."