82 BIG GAME FIELDS 



(Booklaul by name), who did the cooking and 

 acted as general house servant. 



Soon the not unpleasant odor of cooking was 

 wafted up our way, and shortly Booklaul ap- 

 peared with two steaming pots one of boiled 

 ant-bear, the other of boiled monkey. Aside 

 from the name, which is a little startling at first, 

 I found them very good. Adding to this cassava 

 bread and baked plantain, we had a very enjoy- 

 able and typically tropical dinner. The meal 

 over, we extinguished the lamp, to discourage the 

 mosquitoes, and sat talking in the dark. 



"He is the very devil himself, this tiger with 

 the cattle appetite," remarked Haley, as he leaned 

 back in his chair, rolling a cigarette, then the 

 match, flaring up, bathed his dark face in a 

 pinkish glow. "He has killed over twenty head 

 in the last few months," he continued; "he knows 

 just as well as we do that he is on dangerous 

 ground, and he seems to possess the craft and 

 cunning of the old boy himself while he is carry- 

 ing on his diabolical work. Why, he'll make two 

 or three 'kills' in a week, and then, perhaps, he 

 won't show up for a month; or he may kill to- 

 night, and then he may shift ten miles to-morrow. 

 Out of a score of these fellows I've killed, this 



