SOUTH AMERICA. 
217 
to carry back a mutilated specimen. I rejected their third 
proposition with firmness, and darted a disdainful- 
eye upon the Indians. 
Daddy Quashi was again beginning to remon¬ 
strate, and I chased him on the sand-bank for a 
quarter of a mile. He told me afterwards, he 
thought he should have dropped down dead with 
fright, for he w r as firmly persuaded, if I had caught 
him, I should have bundled him into the cayman’s 
jaws. Here then we stood, in silence, like a calm 
before a thunder-storm. “ Hoc res summa loco. 
Scinditur in contraria vulgus.” They wanted to kill 
him, and I wanted to take him alive. 
I now walked up and down the sand, revolving 
a dozen projects in my head. The canoe was at a 
considerable distance, and I ordered the people to 
bring it round to the place where we were. The 
mast was eight feet long, and not much thicker than 
my wrist. I took it out of the canoe, and wrapped 
the sail round the end of it. Now it appeared clear 
to me, that if I w^ent down upon one knee, and held 
the mast in the same position as the soldier holds 
his bayonet when rushing to the charge, I could 
force it down the cayman’s throat, should he come 
open-mouthed at me. When this was told to the 
Indians, they brightened up, and said they would 
help me to pull him out of the river. 
“ Brave squad ! ” said I to myself, u c Audax Prepare 
omnia perpeti,’ now that you have got me betwixt the cay- 
yourselves and danger.” I then mustered all hands alive, 
for the last time before the battle. We were, four 
South American savages, two negroes from Africa, 
