look at some big tree almost hidden under the mass of Spanish moss.

Alice, who had gone to the bow, was looking ahead, when suddenly she
called out:

"Oh, look at the funny logs! They're bobbing up and down all over. See!"

Jed and the others looked to where she pointed, toward a sand bar in the
stream. Then the old hunter called out:

"Logs! Them ain't logs! Them's alligators! We've run into a regular nest
of 'em! I'm glad I brought my gun along!"

"Oh! Alligators!" gasped Ruth, as one thrust his long and repulsive head
from the water, just ahead of the boat.




CHAPTER XIX

INTO THE WILDS


Had there been any convenient mode of running away Ruth and Alice would
certainly have taken advantage of it just then. But they were out in a
boat, in the middle of a wide, sluggish stream, and all about them,
swimming, diving, coming up and crawling over a long sand-bar, were
alligators--alligators on all sides. They were surrounded by them now,
and the girls would no more have gotten out of the boat, even if there