Captain Smith caught him by the shoulders just under the arms, and bracing himself against a tree, gave a mighty jerk. Forth came the bedraggled Adam, smeared in slime up to his breast. The ludicrous sight filled the Captain with silent mirth as he plodded along beside him and listened to the slimy water slushing in his boots at every step.
After an hour of arduous toil they came out upon firm ground. There before them rose the temple. Trees planted thickly together formed the walls; their branches twisted and matted together, the roof. Countless passion-flowers crept in and out among the trunks, and spread their purple flowers in a thick coverlet over the entire structure. A yellow glare from pitch pine torches within gleamed through the many crevices, like millions of fireflies.
Adam would not stir a step until with much labor he had gotten off his boots and emptied out the mud and slime.
Not an Indian was to be seen as they stole toward the house, and, avoiding the door, made for an opening in the wall through which a broad beam of light streamed out. This opening was so large that both Smith and Adam could gain a clear view of the interior without being seen themselves.
As Adam opened his mouth to utter a groan of horror, Smith clapped his hand upon it and whispered, “Do you want to be scalped? Keep still if you value your life.”
Such an awful picture they had never looked upon before. Here in the midst of the American wilderness was Dante’s Inferno. At the end of the temple opposite the door, high up on a framework of reeds, lay the shriveled remains of past kings and priests. The bodies were painted and decorated in a fearful manner, their claw-like fingers still grasping the bow and arrow. At their feet crouched the stuffed bodies of favorite hounds. Occupying the center of the room was the image of Okee, his frightful face painted in red and black stripes. Ropes of pearls as large as peas hung around his neck, and from the crown of his head stood up a tuft of eagle feathers dyed green and red. His staring eyes, enclosed in broad white circles, gazed unwinkingly upon the priests surrounding him.
Their naked bodies, clothed only in an apron of skin, were painted red and black in imitation of the god. Writhing green snakes, hanging in holes bored in their ears, hit viciously with arrow-head tongues at their foaming lips as they whirled in the devil’s dance.
Rattling pebbles shut up in conch shells, together with the hollow boom of membrane stretched over gourds, added their deafening din to the confusion.
In the background knelt the squaws with buckhorns bound to their heads. Their sobs and lamentations rose to shrieks as the frenzied warriors, black as midnight, tore the suckling babes from their clinging arms to offer them in sacrifice to Okee.
“Let me get behind you, Smith, for mercy’s sake! I see a howling devil glaring right in this direction. Your armor will blunt his arrows before they get around to me,” whispered the irrepressible Adam.