another. The noise grew louder, more terrifying. Suddenly the little
world around me went to smash in one mad upheaval. The roof of the
_tambo_ collapsed and fell upon us. At the same instant I felt some
huge body brush past me, hurling me sprawling to the ground. The noise
was deafening, mingled with the shrieks and excited yellings of my men,
but the object passed swiftly in the direction of the creek.

Some one now thought of striking a light to discover the extent of
the damage. The _tambo_ was a wreck; the hammocks were one tangled
mass. Jerome, who had jumped from his hammock when he first heard
the noise, followed the "hurricane" to the creek and soon solved
the mystery of the storm that swept our little camp. He told us,
it was a jaguar, which had sprung upon the back of a large tapir
while the animal was feeding in the woods behind our _tambo_. The
tapir started for the creek in the hope of knocking the jaguar off
its back by rushing through the underbrush; not succeeding in this,
its next hope was the water in the creek. It had chosen a straight
course through our _tambo_.

The next day we were successful in killing two howling monkeys;
these were greeted with loud yells of joy, as we had not been able
to locate any game during the last twenty-four hours' march. This is
easy to understand. We were much absorbed in cutting our way through
the bushes and the game was scared away long before we could sight it.

After the ninth day of wearisome journeying, the Chief found signs
of numerous caoutchouc trees, indicating a rich district, and it was
accordingly decided that _tambo_ No. 9 should be our last. We were
now fully 150 miles from the Floresta headquarters and some 120 miles
back in the absolutely unknown. That night the temperature went down