the preparations for the night were very simple. adam, whose previous experience in camping and rough life had made him think, before leaving the steamer, of a good many little things that might be useful on a journey such as the one proposed, had brought with him a long, thin rope, something like a clothes-line.
“there’s nothin’ like havin’ plenty of line along,” he said, as he fastened one end of this to a low branch of a tree. “it always comes in useful. i’m goin’ to hang the tarpaulin on this, and make a tent of it.”
“the rope is long enough,” said phœnix.
“yes,” said adam; “but you can’t have a rope too long. the nearest tree that ’twould do to tie it to might be a hundred feet away, don’t you see?”
[51]there was a suitable tree, however, not a dozen feet from the one just mentioned, and to a low branch of this adam made his line fast, tying it in a slip-knot, and coiling the slack rope on the ground. this proceeding was made the text of another sermon from the prudent sailor.
“never cut a line, if you can help it,” he said. “use what you want, and coil away the slack. the time will come when you’ll want the longest line you can get.”
the tarpaulin was thrown over the low rope, and its edges held out by cords and pegs, which adam had prepared while the supper was being cooked.
“it’ll be pretty close quarters,” he said, looking into the little tent, “but you fellers can squeeze into it, and i can sleep outside as well as not. the sand is as dry as a chip, and if you put on your overcoats, and take your carpet-bags for pillows, you’ll be just as comfortable as if you was at home in your feather beds.”
“a good deal more so, i should think,” said phil, “in mild weather like this.”
the boys would not allow adam to sleep outside. as the tarpaulin was arranged, if there was room enough for three, there was room enough for four. the tent was open at both ends, and they lay in pairs, with their feet inside and their heads near the open ends, so as to get plenty of air.
adam was soon asleep, but the boys did not[52] close their eyes for some time. the novelty of the situation as they thus lay on the soft dry sand, with the tropical foliage all around them, the broad river rippling but a short distance away, and the darkness of this night in an almost foreign land, relieved only by the flashes of the dying camp-fire and the bright stars in the clear sky, kept them awake.
far off in the river they heard, every now and then, a dull pounding noise, as if some one were thumping at the door of a house. this, adam told them before he went to sleep, was caused by the drum-fish, who make these loud sounds as they swim near the bottom of the river.
now and then they heard a distant snort or roar, but from what sort of animal it came they did not know. they were aware that in the woods of florida there were panthers, bears, and wild-cats; but adam had told them that in this part of the country these animals were very shy and seldom disturbed any one if not disturbed themselves.
after a time phil and phœnix fell asleep, but chap did not close his eyes. he was an excitable fellow, and he was thinking what he should do if a wild beast should invade their camp. there were no firearms in the party, but he thought of several ways in which four active persons could seize a wild-cat, for instance, and hold it so that it could harm no one of them.
[53]after a time the moon rose, and then chap, lying with his face turned toward the river, was fascinated by the strange beauty of the scene.
while gazing thus, he saw two small animals slowly creeping across the sand and approaching the tent. the sight of them startled him, and he was about to give an alarm, when he suddenly checked himself. these could not be wild-cats, he thought; they were too little and their movements too slow.
as they came nearer and turned their heads toward him, he saw by the now bright rays of the moon that they had light triangular faces, gray bodies, and rat-like tails, and that they were opossums. he had seen these animals in the north, and laughed quietly when he thought they had frightened him. they were evidently after some pieces of fish which lay near the dead ashes of the camp-fire, and were soon making a comfortable meal.
“i never saw such tame creatures,” thought chap. “they must know there are people about.”
then he gave a low, soft whistle. the opossums looked up, but did not move. there was a piece of stick within reach of his hand, and picking it up, he whirled it toward them. they looked up again, but still did not move.
slowly drawing himself out of the tent so as not to disturb the others, chap rose to his feet and approached the opossums. one of them turned and[54] ambled slowly to a short distance, but the other stood still.
chap walked close up to him, but the creature merely arched its back and looked at him.
picking up a stick which was lying near the ashes, chap gave the stupid creature a little punch. the opossum merely twisted itself up a little and opened its mouth.
“upon my word!” said chap; “if you are not the tamest wild beasts in the world! i don’t believe either of you ever saw a man before, and don’t know that you ought to be afraid of him. but i’m not going to hurt a non-resistant. you can go ahead and eat your supper, for all i care.”
and so he slipped quietly back into the tent, and left the opossums to continue their meal.
it might have been supposed that when chap did close his eyes, he would sleep longer than the others, but this was not the case. either because he did not rest well in a new place, or because his mind was disturbed by his responsibilities as captain of the party, he awoke before any of the others. it was broad daylight, and again he slipped out of the tent without disturbing any of his companions.
the opossums were gone, and chap walked along the water’s edge, looking at the hosts of birds which were flying above him. there were gulls and many others which he did not know, and near the[55] other side of the river was a small flock of very large birds, which he supposed must be pelicans.
as he walked round the little clump of trees, under which the tent was pitched, he saw upon the sand, near the water’s edge, something which made his heart jump.
it was an alligator, the first chap had ever seen out of a menagerie. it was about eight feet long, and was lying in the sunshine, with its head toward the water.
chap stood and gazed at it with mingled amazement and delight. he never thought of fear, for he knew an alligator would not come after him.
slowly and gradually he came nearer and nearer the strange creature. it did not move. was it dead? or asleep? he felt sure it was the latter, for it did not look dead. what a splendid thing it was to be so near a live alligator on its native sands! if there were only some way of catching it! that was almost too glorious to think of. if he had a rifle he might shoot it; but that would be nothing. but to catch it alive! the idea fired his soul. he would give anything to capture this fellow, but how could he do it?
he remembered the account that had so pleased him, when he was a boy, of the english captain—waterton, he thought his name was—who sprang astride of an alligator, and seizing its forepaws, twisted them over its back so that the creature[56] could not walk, nor reach its captor with its jaws or tail.
at first chap thought that he might possibly do this, but he saw it would be a risky business. the alligator’s paws looked very strong, and he might not be able to hold them above its back. even if it got one paw loose, it might turn round and make things lively.
“if i could only get a rope round the end of his tail,” thought chap, “i could tie him to a tree. that would be simply splendid!”
this plan really looked more feasible than any other. the alligator was lying with his tail turned a little to the left, and the end of it raised slightly from the sand. it might be possible to slip a rope around this without waking the creature; but where was the rope? chap racked his brain for an instant. had they a rope?
then he remembered the line that supported the tent. there was ever so much of it coiled on the sand, it was already fastened to a tree. if the loose length would reach the alligator, and if he could get the end of it around his tail, and the line was strong enough to hold him, he would have him sure.
wouldn’t it be glorious to wake up the other fellows and show them the captive alligator which he had caught all by himself while they were fast asleep?
[57]slipping off his shoes, he stole softly around to the foot of the tree by the tent where the coil of rope lay. taking the loose end in his hand, he turned, and slowly crept toward the alligator.
the creature was asleep, and chap made so little noise as he gradually came near it, that its repose was not disturbed. to his great joy, chap found that the rope was long enough. when he was almost near enough to touch the tip and of the alligator’s tail, he kneeled on one knee, ready to spring up in an instant if the creature should awake, and hesitated for a moment before proceeding to attach the rope.
if he tried to tie it on, the alligator might move before he had time to make a good knot. it would be better to prepare a slip-noose, and put that over the end of his tail. then when he moved or jerked, he would pull the rope tight.
chap made a slip-knot and a noose, and, with quickly-beating heart, he leaned forward, and with both hands he gently put the open noose around the alligator’s tail.
he did this so cautiously and carefully that the rope did not touch the creature until it was seven or eight inches above the tip of the tail. then he gently pulled it so as to tighten it.
almost at the first moment that the rope touched the alligator it gave its tail a little twitch. chap sprang to his feet and ran backward[58] several yards. then the alligator raised its head, looked back, and saw him.
without a moment’s hesitation the creature lifted itself on its short legs and made for the river. chap trembled with the excitement of the moment. would the noose slip off? would the rope hold?
the noose did not slip off, it tightened; and in a moment the rope was stretched to its utmost length.
chap was about to give a shout of triumph, when the alligator, feeling a tug on his tail, became panic-stricken and bolted wildly for the water.
the rope, though not heavy, was a strong one, and it did not break, but the slip-knot around the nearest tree to which it was tied was pulled loose in an instant, and down came the tent on the sleepers beneath it.
then there was a tremendous jerk on the branch to which the extreme end was tied, and in an instant it was torn from the trunk of the tree.
this branch caught in the end of the tarpaulin, the pegs were jerked out of the sand, and the whole tent was hauled roughly and swiftly over the recumbent adam and the two boys. the branch got under phil’s head and jerked him into a sitting position almost before it woke him up.
[59]phœnix thought an earthquake had occurred. in an instant he was enveloped in darkness; then there seemed to be a land slide over his head, and flying bits of wood banged about his ears.
adam made a grab at the tarpaulin as it swept over him, and held fast to one corner of it. he was instantly jerked about three yards along the sand, and then the branch, to which the end of the rope was tied, slipped under the tarpaulin, and adam and the tent were left lying together on the ground.
chap made a wild rush after the branch, but it was pulled into the water before he could reach it. he could see it floating rapidly along the top of the water, as the alligator swam away, and he stood sadly on the bank, watching the disappearance of that branch and his hopes.
adam, with the two boys, now appeared, half awake and utterly astounded, and anxiously demanded to know what had happened. never had they been awakened in such a startling style. when chap explained the state of affairs, phil and phœnix burst into a laugh, but adam looked rather glum.
“you don’t mean to say,” he exclaimed, “that that ’gator has gone off with all my rope?”
“he’s got it all,” said chap; “and i’m sorry now it didn’t break, so some of it might have been[60] left. but i tell you what we could do, if we could only get a boat; we could run after that branch—it won’t sink, you know—and when we got hold of the rope we might haul the alligator in.”
“haul him in!” cried adam; “i’d like to see myself hauling a live alligator into a boat, even if we could do it, and had a boat. no, that line is gone for good. he’s turned round and chawed it off his tail by this time.”
“what did you expect to do with your alligator,” asked phil, “after you had fastened him to a tree? we haven’t anything to kill him with, and he would have raged around at the end of his line like a mad bull.”
“perhaps chap thought he could tame it, and take it along with us,” said phœnix.
“look here, boys,” said chap, “i don’t want any criticisms on this alligator business. if i’d been acting as your captain, and leading you in an alligator hunt, you might say what you pleased when the beast got away; but i was doing this thing in my private capacity, and not as commander of the party, and you fellows have nothing to do with it.”
“haven’t we?” cried phil. “when my head was nearly jerked off, and three or four yards of tent hauled over my face?”
“and i was scared worse than if i had been pulled out of bed with a rake?” said phœnix.
[61]“nothin’ to do with it!” exclaimed adam. “when my rope was jerked out of sight and hearin’ in a minute, and the tarpaulin would ’a’ gone with it, if i hadn’t grabbed it? i should think we had something to do with it.”
“perhaps you had,” said chap, as he sat down on the sand to put on his shoes. “but i tell you what it is, fellows,” he added, with sparkling eyes, “if we could have tied a live alligator to a tree, it would have been a splendid thing to tell when we got home.”
“there is people,” said adam, dryly, “who’d tell a story like that without tyin’ a ’gator to a tree.”
“but we are not that kind,” promptly answered captain chap.
“but i guess we won’t cry over spilt milk, or lost ropes, either,” said adam; “and the best thing we kin do is to get along to john brewer’s house and see about some breakfast.”
“we might catch some more fish,” said chap, “and have breakfast before we started.”
“if you kin ketch some coffee,” said adam, “i’ll be willin’ to talk about breakfast here; but i don’t want to make another meal off fish and warm water, if i can help it. john brewer’s house is just the other side of that bend, and we’ll be there in half an hour.”
the tarpaulin was rolled up, each of the party[62] picked up his individual traps, and, headed by chap, they were soon walking along the shore of the river.
when they turned the bend above, they were delighted to see that adam was right, and that john brewer’s house was really there. it was not much of a house, for it was a frame building, one story high, and containing three or four rooms; but it had an air of human habitation about it which was very welcome to the wanderers. it stood in a small clearing, and john brewer, a little man, with long, brown hair, which looked as if the wind had been blowing it in several directions during the night, came out of his front door to meet them. two of his children followed him, and the three others and his wife looked out of a half-opened window.
mr. brewer was mildly surprised to see his old acquaintance, adam, and the three boys, and when he had heard their story, he took a kind but languid interest in the matter, and went into the house to see about getting breakfast.
it was not long before our friends were sitting down to a plentiful meal of coffee, corn-bread, and very tough bacon, mr. brewer and his family standing at the end of the table and gazing at them as they ate. some of them would have joined the breakfast-party had there been plates and cups enough.
[63]about half an hour after breakfast, as our friends, with mr. brewer and four of the children, were sitting in the shade in front of the house, and mrs. brewer and the other child were looking at them behind a half-opened window-shutter, adam remarked,—
“what i want to know is what chance we have of gettin’ up the river to titusville?”
“how did you expect to get up?” asked mr. brewer.
“well,” said adam, “i thought we might get passage in a mail-boat, if one happened to come along at the right time; and if it didn’t, i thought there’d be some boat or other goin’ up the river to-day that would take us.”
“well, if them’s your kalkerlations,” said mr. brewer, gently rubbing his knees and looking out over the water, “i don’t think you’re going to get up at all.”
“not get up at all!” cried the boys; and adam looked puzzled.
“well, not for a week or so, anyway,” said mr. brewer, his eyes still fixed upon the rippling waters. “to be sure, the mail-boat will be along to-day, and she’ll stop if she’s hailed, but she can’t carry you all, and as for other boats, the long and short of it is, there ain’t none gone down, and there can’t none come up. there was a boat went up yesterday with vegetables from lake worth, but[64] she won’t be back for a week, and then it’ll be a good while before she goes up again. every boat that’s been down the river this month has gone up, and they tell me there ain’t nothin’ at jupiter but the little sloop that belongs to the light-house keeper, and she’s hauled up to have a new mast put in her.”
“then what are we to do?” asked phil, anxiously.
“dunno,” said mr. brewer.
