Histah, the snake, was there. He saw him in
the trees in greater numbers than he ever had seen Histah before;
and once beside a reedy pool he caught a scent that could have
belonged to none other than Gimla the crocodile, but upon none of
these did the Tarmangani care to feed.
And so, as he craved meat, he turned his attention to the birds
above him. His assailants of the night before had not disarmed
him. Either in the darkness and the rush of the charging lions the
human foe had overlooked him or else they had considered him dead;
but whatever the reason he still retained his weapons--his spear
and his long knife, his bow and arrows, and his grass rope.
Fitting a shaft to his bow Tarzan awaited an opportunity to bring
down one of the larger birds, and when the opportunity finally
presented itself he drove the arrow straight to its mark. As the
gaily plumaged creature fluttered to earth its companions and the
little monkeys set up a most terrific chorus of wails and screaming
protests. The whole forest became suddenly a babel of hoarse screams
and shrill shrieks.
Tarzan would not have been surprised had one or two birds in the
immediate vicinity given voice to terror as they fled, but that the
whole life of the jungle should set up so weird a protest filled
him with disgust. It was an angry face that he turned up toward
the monkeys and the birds as there suddenly stirred within him a
savage inclination to voice his displeasure and his answer to what
he considered their challenge.
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