132 CAMPS IN THE CARIBBEES. 



eighty feet. About twenty feet up he rested a moment, 

 and requested me to attach the bundle of smoking 

 fagots to a liane ; he then drew it up to him and stuck 

 it into a crevice. 



Then he went up again, — he didn't "shin," by 

 clinging with his arms and legs ; the tree was too 

 broad, and the mass of vines and plants too enormous 

 for that, — but he just seized a liane, like a rope, 

 between his toes, the great toe and the one next it, 

 and -walked up, hand over hand, and toe over toe. 

 The pannier fastened to his shoulders, and the cutlass 

 dangling behind from his belt, gave him the appear- 

 ance of a hump-backed monkey, as he ascended 

 rapidly, half enveloped in smoke. Great parasites, 

 with leaves like cabbage leaves, and orchids large as 

 peonies, came crashing down, sprinkling me with 

 water from their inverted calyxes, as he went on 

 steadily climbing. 



At last he reached a point just beneath the hole, at 

 a height equal to the mast-head of a brig, and then, 

 holding on with one hand, he drew up the firebrands 

 and thrust their unlighted ends into a crevice a little 

 below the hole. He signaled me to attach the calabash 

 to a lialine no larger than a fish-line, which I did, 

 and awaited further orders. Detaching a brand from 

 the bundle, he thrust it into the hole previous to put- 

 ting in his hand. He was almost hidden by a cloud 

 of angry bees, who, stupefied bv the smoke, did not 

 seem to recognize in him an enemy, and hundreds 

 alighted upon his shirt and pantaloons, and many on 

 his bare legs. The hole was too small, and Meyong 

 enlarged it with his cutlass ; previously, however, he 

 had formed a staging upon which to stand, about 



