another way. The great hills that crowd one another up against the sky are
so infested and overridden by this enormous forest-growth, and the
underbrush is so dense, it would be impossible for a 'tenderfoot' to gain
any clear idea of his direction. I should be a lost man the moment I
ventured out of call. Woodcraft must be a sixth sense which we lost with
the rest of our Eden birthright when we strayed from innocence, when we
ceased to sleep with one ear on the ground, and to spell our way by the
moss on tree-trunks. In these solitudes, as we call them, ranks and clouds
of witnesses rise up to prove us deaf and blind. Busy couriers are passing
every moment of the day; and we do not see, nor hear, nor understand. We
are the stocks and stones. Packer John is our only wood-sharp;--yet the
last half of the name doesn't altogether fit him. He is a one-sided
character, handicapped, I should say, by some experience that has humbled
and perplexed him. Two and two perhaps refused to make four in his account
with men, and he gave up the proposition. And now he consorts with trees,
and hunts to live, not to kill. He has an impersonal, out-door odor about
him, such as the cleanest animals have. I would as soon eat out of his
dry, hard, cool hand, as from a chunk of pine-bark.

"It is amusing to see him with a certain member of the party who tries to
be fresh with him. He has a disconcerting eye when he fixes it on a man,
or turns it away from one who has said a coarse or a foolish thing.

"'The jungle is large,' he seems to say, 'and the cub he is small. Let him
think and be still!'"

"Who is this 'certain member' who tries to be 'fresh'?" Christine inquired
with perceptible warmth.

"The cook, perhaps," said Moya prudently.