"No good for Missa to cry, Missa must go see gin," said the Black, and as he spoke they came in sight of a little group of native huts, bark-thatched and dimly seen through the darkness. Into the smallest of these the Black stumbled and set his burden before a couch on which lay a black woman wasted with fever.

"Brought you white child," he said. The hut was full of Blacks, but Jean was too frightened and tired to think of any of them, and she covered her face with her hands and sobbed as if her heart would break.

FOOTNOTES:

[7] Black women.

[8] This bird makes a play-ground before the tree in which it builds its nest. It has a floor of sticks, and over this is built a little bower into which are woven bright feathers, white shells, etc.


CHAPTER VII

JEAN FINDS A FRIEND

Jean stopped crying, for she found that it did no good. She curled up in the corner of the dark hut and waited to see what would happen. The Blacks talked and jabbered around her, but she could not at all understand what they said, and she was too little to understand that she was in any danger. She only wished with all her heart that she might see her mother. The Blacks talked together, and Jean at last was so tired that she curled up on the floor and went to sleep. When she awoke and opened her eyes she was surprised to find that the sun was shining.