"For God's sake keep quiet," thundered the Professor to the excited
crowd. "Do not irritate him, and all will be well." He dragged to the
ground a heroic Cousin Jack miner who was climbing the verandah post.
"Back, man, back," he cried, "or all is lost."

The Professor strode up and down with all a heavy villain's
impressiveness and orated. His eloquence was drowned by a great
hullabaloo at the next corner, and with a rattle and a yell four firemen
came tearing down the road with a hose-reel. Some excited individual had,
rung the fire-bell. The firemen attached the hose to a plug, and came on,
hydrant in hand. It required all the Professor's energies, supplemented
by the frenzied protestations of Kit See, to prevent them turning a full
stream of water on the gorilla.

The crowd was now a large one, gathered far out on the road, where a good
view of the roof was obtainable, and when the excitement occasioned by
the fire men had subsided, a fresh outburst was provoked by the
appearance of another huge monkey, the great bulk of which came up slowly
over the left ridge. The second monkey, which was much larger than the
gorilla, sat upon the apex of the roof, jabbered at Ammonia, and the
gorilla turned towards him, baring his teeth in a hideous grin of malice.

"Keep still!" yelled Professor Thunder. "Keep quiet, for the love of
heaven! Mahdi, the Missing Link, will save the che--e--ild! Mahdi, the
animal that approaches nearest to man, captured by me in the dark jungles
of Darkest Africa. Observe."

The gorilla seemed animated with an implacable hatred for the larger
monkey. The shades of night were falling, but the people in the street