Herbert Strang

Swift and Sure Herbert Strang

Publisher Marketing: The level rays of the early sun were struggling with the mist that lingered upon a broad full river, like a sluggard loth to quit his bed. As yet the contest was unequal, for the banks of the stream were covered with trees and shrubs, crowding upon one another as if in competition for elbow-room, through whose thick ravelled foliage the sunbeams could not clear a way. Here and there, however, the dense screen was parted by little alleys or open spaces carpeted with grass or moss, and through these a golden radiance shone, dispersing the mist, and throwing a glistening pathway across the river. At one such glade, withdrawn a little from the brink, stood a jaguar, which, from moment to moment, lifted its head and gave utterance to a roar. It faced the stream: its tail lashed its flanks, to the annoyance of countless flies which would fain have found a temporary lodgment in its sleek and glossy coat. It roared, and roared again, with curious persistence, for the mere pleasure of roaring, an observer might have thought. And yet such a person, had he been worthy of the name observer, would have detected a reason for this strange behaviour. Had he watched the surface of the water opposite to where the jaguar stood, he would have marked a gradual assembling of greenish-yellow objects, scaly and hard; and, set in each, two glassy leering eyes. They were in fact the snouts of alligators, or caymans as they are known in Venezuela.