The coon and possum were skinned at once and roasted on sticks over the coals. None of them ate much of the coon—its meat tasted somewhat like young pork but was rather too fat and strong, in flavor. The possum, however, they found delicious, the meat being white, tender and sweet.
As soon as they had eaten and tied up what remained in their handkerchiefs, they once more took up their journey.
They traveled steadily all the morning but with no signs apparent of reaching the edge of the belt of cypress. As far as they could see ahead of them along the shore the forest continued in an unbroken line.
Noon brought them to a serious obstacle, a broad, slow-flowing river of black, muddy water. They were all good swimmers and could have easily swam the half mile which separated them from the other shore, but the sight of several large, floating, log-like objects made them hesitate to attempt it.
"Those are either alligators or crocodiles," Charley said. "We had better make sure which they are before we venture in. Alligators are cowardly creatures, and will seldom attack a man, but crocodiles are not to be trifled with."
It was some time before one of the floating monsters came near enough to reveal its character but when it did they were glad they had waited. It was a vicious, scaly-looking crocodile, fully fifteen feet in length.
"Hard luck," commented Charley in disgust. "That means we will have to follow this bank up until we can find a place we can cross and then follow the other bank back to the gulf again. It may be only a few miles or it may be a hundred. It may take us a day or it may take us a week."
"I wonder what river this is?" Walter said. "If we only knew, we could tell where we are."
"It's impossible to say for certain," his chum replied. "There are a lot of big rivers emptying into the gulf. I am inclined to think, however, that this is the Snake River. It fits the description I've heard of the Snake. Well, let's have dinner and then we'll start to follow it up."
A fire was lit and while it was getting under way, Walter succeeded in catching a leather-back turtle of which there were numbers basking on logs. This they cooked by the simple expedient of burying it in the coals and letting it roast in its own shell.