280 JUNGLE PEACE 



thing we could see — a great thickening near the 

 center of the snake: it had fed recently and to 

 repletion, and slowly it was making its way to 

 some hidden lair, perhaps to lie motionless until 

 another moon should silver the jungle. Was 

 there any stranger life in the world? 



Whether it was a giant bushmaster or a con- 

 strictor, we could not tell in the diffused light. 

 I allowed it to go unharmed, for the spell of 

 silence and the jungle night was too strongly 

 woven to be shattered again by the crash of gun 

 or rifle. Nupee had been quite willing to remain 

 behind, and now, as so often with my savage 

 friends, he looked at me wonderingly. He did 

 not understand and I could not explain. We 

 were at one in the enjoyment of direct phenom- 

 ena; we could have passed months of intimate 

 companionship in the wilds as I had done with 

 his predecessors; but at the touch of abstract 

 things, of letting a deadly creature live for any 

 reason except for lack of a gun — then they 

 looked at me always with that puzzled look, 

 that straining to grasp the something which they 

 knew must be there. And at once always fol- 

 lowed instant acceptance, unquestioning, without 

 protest. The transition was smooth, direct, com- 



