Aboo Din lashed them mercilessly and drove them into the jungle, where he
followed on his hands and knees. I only waited to don my green kaki suit and
canvas shooting hat and despatch a man to the neighboring kampong, or village,
to ask the punghulo (chief) to send me his shikaris, or hunters. Then I plunged
into the jungle path that my kebuns had cut with their keen parangs, or jungle-
knives. Ten feet within the confines of the forest the metallic glare of the sun and
the pitiless reflections of the China Sea were lost in a dim, green twilight. Far
ahead I could hear the half-hearted snarls of the cowardly, deserting curs, and
Aboo Din’s angry voice rapidly exhausting the curses of the Koran on their
heads.
My men, who were naked save for a cotton sarong wound around their waists,
slashed here a rubber-vine, there a thorny rattan, and again a mass of creepers
that were as tenacious as iron ropes, all the time pressing forward at a rapid
walk. Ofttimes the trail led from the solid ground through a swamp where grew
great sago palms, and out of which a black, sluggish stream flowed toward the
straits. Gray iguanas and pendants of dove orchids hung from the limbs above,
and green and gold lizards scuttled up the trees at our approach.
At the first plot of wet ground Aboo Din sent up a shout, and awaited my
coming. I found him on his hands and knees, gazing stupidly at the prints in the
moist earth.
“Tuan,” he shouted, “see Baboo’s feet, one—two—three—more! Praise be to
Allah!”
I dropped down among the lily-pads and pitcher-plants beside him. There, sure
enough, close by the catlike footmarks of the tiger, was the perfect impression of
one of Baboo’s bare feet. Farther on was the imprint of another, and then a third.
Wonderful! The intervals between the several footmarks were far enough apart
for the stride of a man!
“Apa?” (What does it mean?) I said.
Aboo Din tore his hair and called upon Allah and the assembled Malays to
witness that he was the father of this Baboo, but that, in the sight of Mohammed,
he was innocent of this witchcraft. He had striven from Hari Rahmadan to Hari