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Soon I observed him sitting by the bank of the stream, in which he had
been bathing. He had nothing on but his flannel shirt, and his natural
habits of extreme neatness having reasserted themselves, he was
actively employed in making a most elaborate toilet. He had washed his
gutta-percha collar, had thoroughly shaken out his trousers, coat and
waistcoat, and was now folding them up neatly till he was ready to put
them on, shaking his head sadly as he scanned the numerous rents and
tears in them, which naturally had resulted from our frightful
journey. Then he took his boots, scrubbed them with a handful of fern,
and finally rubbed them over with a piece of fat, which he had
carefully saved from the /inco/ meat, till they looked, comparatively
speaking, respectable. Having inspected them judiciously through his
eye-glass, he put the boots on and began a fresh operation. From a
little bag that he carried he produced a pocket-comb in which was
fixed a tiny looking-glass, and in this he surveyed himself.
Apparently he was not satisfied, for he proceeded to do his hair with
great care. Then came a pause whilst he again contemplated the effect;
still it was not satisfactory. He felt his chin, on which the
accumulated scrub of a ten days' beard was flourishing.

"Surely," thought I, "he is not going to try to shave." But so it was.
Taking the piece of fat with which he had greased his boots, Good
washed it thoroughly in the stream. Then diving again into the bag he
brought out a little pocket razor with a guard to it, such as are
bought by people who are afraid of cutting themselves, or by those
about to undertake a sea voyage. Then he rubbed his face and chin
vigorously with the fat and began. Evidently it proved a painful
process, for he groaned very much over it, and I was convulsed with
inward laughter as I watched him struggling with that stubbly beard.
It seemed so very odd that a man should take the trouble to shave
himself with a piece of fat in such a place and in our circumstances.
At last he succeeded in getting the hair off the right side of his
face and chin, when suddenly I, who was watching, became conscious of
a flash of light that passed just by his head.

Good sprang up with a profane exclamation (if it had not been a safety
razor he would certainly have cut his throat), and so did I, without
the exclamation, and this was what I saw. Standing not more than
twenty paces from where I was, and ten from Good, were a group of men.
They were very tall and copper-coloured, and some of them wore great
plumes of black feathers and short cloaks of leopard skins; this was
all I noticed at the moment. In front of them stood a youth of about
seventeen, his hand still raised and his body bent forward in the
attitude of a Grecian statue of a spear-thrower. Evidently the flash
of light had been caused by a weapon which he had hurled.

As I looked an old soldier-like man stepped forward out of the group,

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