Uncle Paul, Sambo, and I, carrying some rope between us, hastened off to get out the pig. On reaching the pitfall, Uncle Paul, looking down, exclaimed,—“It was well, Tim, that you did not jump in to help out your friend. Just see his mouth!” And poking the end of his stick in front of the creature’s nose, it exhibited a pair of tusks sharp as lancets. “It is a pig, certainly, but very unlike the pig of northern lands,” he observed. “This creature is a peccary; and though it is of no great size, it is one of the most savage little animals in existence. A herd of them will run down a jaguar; and though he may slay a few with his paws, they will soon worry him to death with their sharp tusks, having nothing like fear in their composition. We will take the precaution of securing it before we haul it out, or it will be sure to do some of us an injury.”
A noose having been formed, it was slipped over the peccary’s head, and the animal was hauled-out and quickly despatched. Uncle Paul then showed us a gland on the hinder part of the back, which he carefully cut out, remarking that unless this was done it would impart a disagreeable flavour to the rest of the meat. Tim and Sambo, after having secured it to the end of a long stick, carried it in triumph to the settlement. We found the meat excellent; and what we could not eat was smoked and laid by for the voyage.
Tim was still dissatisfied at not being able to tame a few peccaries to keep in his hut. He had sallied forth at daybreak one morning, bow in hand, in search of game, promising to be back at breakfast. When breakfast-time came, however, Tim did not appear. Arthur and I waited for an hour or more, till we became somewhat anxious about our faithful follower, and at last determined to go in search of him. We had noted the direction he had taken, and hoped, therefore, to get upon his track. We first visited the pitfall. It was empty; but we caught sight of some recently broken twigs some way beyond, which showed that he had gone further. On we went, therefore, shooting several birds which came in our way.
We were pushing on, when we heard a voice which we knew to be Tim’s shouting out, “Up a tree! up a tree, gentlemen—for your lives!” We looked round. Fortunately one was near, the branches of which enabled us, without difficulty, to climb up it. At that instant we caught sight of several dozen black-skinned creatures rushing towards us. Up the tree we sprang; and scarcely had we got a few feet from the ground when a whole herd of peccaries came rushing towards us, ploughing up the ground with their tusks, and exhibiting other signs of rage.
No sooner had we seated ourselves on a bough than we made out Tim a little way off, perched in the same manner upon another tree. It was pretty clear that he had been besieged by the herd, as we now were.
We shouted to him, inquiring how long he had been there.
“For the last two hours or more,” was his answer. “I was just walking through the forest on my way home when these terrible little bastes caught sight of me; and if I had not sprung up this tree like lightning, they would have dug their sharp tusks into my legs. Though I have shot every arrow I had at my back, and have killed half a score of them, nothing I could do would make them go away; and by my faith, too, the brutes seem determined to starve us out.”
This was not pleasant, as we might expect to be treed in the same manner. We determined, however, to do what we could to put the peccaries to flight, and began shooting away; taking good aim, that we might not uselessly expend our arrows. The little brutes kept rushing about below us, now and then charging against the trunk of the tree, and then looking up at us with their wicked eyes, evidently wishing that we might slip and tumble down among them.
“A pretty condition we should be in if we did so,” I remarked to Arthur.
“Take care what you are about, then,” he answered. “Keep your feet firmly fixed on the branch below you before you shoot.”