This was no sooner said than done, and l'Encuerado leaped on board, dragging his victim after him.
The peccaries collected on the shore continued to utter loud grunts of rage; but we were beyond their reach, for the raft was soon carried past them by the current.
"Are peccaries carnivorous?" asked Lucien.
"Yes, indeed, Chanito. If one of us had been knocked down by the band, there wouldn't be much left now but bones."
"Isn't the peccary a wild boar, M. Sumichrast?"
"It is a pachyderm—consequently, a relation of the pig," answered my friend. "The wild boar is solitary, while the peccaries always go in flocks; this makes them formidable enemies in spite of their small size."
"What, small! this one is larger than Gringalet!"
"The wild boar is twice as big. A characteristic of the peccary is, that its tail is rudimentary, and the bristles spotted with black and white; moreover, only its legs are eatable."
L'Encuerado went round the edge of the lake in order to trace the course of the stream. We lost more than an hour in false channels, and the raft ran aground in a shallow.
When the sun had set, and all the birds were flying over us to their retreats, we landed to bivouac for the night.