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She had fled for an hour or two, perhaps, when her attention was arrested by the

sound of animals moving about, muttering and growling close ahead. Assured

that she had covered a sufficient distance to insure her a good start in the

morning before the blacks could take to her trail, and fearful of what the

creatures might be, she climbed into a large tree with the intention of spending

the balance of the night there.

She had no sooner reached a safe and comfortable branch when she discovered

that the tree stood upon the edge of a small clearing that had been hidden from

her by the heavy undergrowth upon the ground below, and simultaneously she

discovered the identity of the beasts she had heard.

In the center of the clearing below her, clearly visible in the bright moonlight, she

saw fully twenty huge, manlike apes--great, shaggy fellows who went upon their

hind feet with only slight assistance from the knuckles of their hands. The

moonlight glanced from their glossy coats, the numerous gray-tipped hairs

imparting a sheen that made the hideous creatures almost magnificent in their

appearance.

The girl had watched them but a minute or two when the little band was joined

by others, coming singly and in groups until there were fully fifty of the great

brutes gathered there in the moonlight. Among them were young apes and several

little ones clinging tightly to their mothers' shaggy shoulders. Presently the group

parted to form a circle about what appeared to be a small, flat-topped mound of

earth in the center of the clearing. Squatting close about this mound were three

old females armed with short, heavy clubs with which they presently began to

pound upon the flat top of the earth mound which gave forth a dull, booming

sound, and almost immediately the other apes commenced to move about

restlessly, weaving in and out aimlessly until they carried the impression of a

moving mass of great, black maggots.

The beating of the drum was in a slow, ponderous cadence, at first without time

but presently settling into a heavy rhythm to which the apes kept time with

measured tread and swaying bodies. Slowly the mass separated into two rings,

the outer of which was composed of shes and the very young, the inner of mature

bulls. The former ceased to move and squatted upon their haunches, while the

bulls now moved slowly about in a circle the center of which was the drum and

all now in the same direction.

It was then that there came faintly to the ears of the girl from the direction of the

village she had recently quitted a weird and high-pitched cry. The effect upon the

apes was electrical--they stopped their movements and stood in attitudes of

intent listening for a moment, and then one fellow, huger than his companions,

Tarzan the Untamed