172 WILD LIFE UNDER THE EQUATOR. 
and gave vent to roar after roar, showing his powerful 
canine teeth. How big they were! they were frightful 
to look upon; the inside of his mouth was so red. 
It was a male gorilla, a real fighting fellow, and was 
not afraid of us. How horrid he looked as the hair on 
the top of his head twitched up and down, and as he 
made the woods ring with his awful roar until the forest 
was full of the din! 
We stood in silence, gun in hand, and I was ready to 
fire, when Malaouen, who is a cool fellow, said, ‘‘ Not yet.” 
The monster, according to them, was not near enough. - 
He stopped for a minute or so, and then seated himself, 
for his legs did not seem well adapted to support. his 
huge body. The gorilla looked at us with his evil gray 
eyes, then beat his breast with his long, powerful, and 
gigantic arms, giving another howl of defiance. How 
awful was that howl! He then advanced upon us. 
Now he stopped, and, though not far off, they all said, 
“Not yet.” I must own to having been somewhat ac- 
customed to see gorillas. I was terribly excited, for I al- 
ways felt that, if the animal was not killed, some one of 
us would be killed. . 
I now judged he was not more than ten or twelve 
yards from us, and I could see plainly the ferocious and 
fiendish face of the monstrous ape. It was working with 
rage; his huge teeth were ground against each other, so . 
that we could hear the sound; the skin of the forehead 
was moved rapidly back and forth, bringing a truly dev- 
ilish expression upon the hideous face; then once more 
he opened his mouth and gave a roar which seemed to 
shake the woods like thunder, and, looking us in the 
eyes and beating his breast, advanced again. This time 
