Why shouldn't
I work my way out of the scrape as well as they did?
Some of them got back home again. Come, then! the
deuce! Cheer up, my boy!"
Thus talking to himself and walking on rapidly, Joe
came right upon a horde of natives in the very depths of
the forest, but he halted in time and was not seen by them.
The negroes were busy poisoning arrows with the juice of
the euphorbium--a piece of work deemed a great affair
among these savage tribes, and carried on with a sort of
ceremonial solemnity.
Joe, entirely motionless and even holding his breath,
was keeping himself concealed in a thicket, when, happening
to raise his eyes, he saw through an opening in the
foliage the welcome apparition of the balloon--the Victoria
herself--moving toward the lake, at a height of only
about one hundred feet above him. But he could not
make himself heard; he dared not, could not make his
friends even see him!
Tears came to his eyes, not of grief but of thankfulness;
his master was then seeking him; his master had
not left him to perish! He would have to wait for the
departure of the blacks; then he could quit his hiding-place
and run toward the borders of Lake Tchad!
But by this time the Victoria was disappearing in the
distant sky.
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