mating the length of that scaly corkscrew,
if uncoiled, with his eye. " Pshaw! I Ve
tamed 'em--and killed 'em, too," he
added.

"Yes! a black snake wouldn't harm
you, even if he did bite." Pem was still
reassuring her friend. "Did you hear him
whistle? ... But--but what's that?"
It was just half a minute later that she
put the question. "He isn't making that
noise with his tail still; is he?"

She looked at Stud. Under the ruby
eye of the lamp his face--the face of a
Stoutheart--had turned suddenly pea-green.

His eyes were fixed upon a gleam of
bloated yellow dimly seen, under the lee of
a rock, not very many yards away--the
venomous, pale yellow of the dropsical
cave fungi.

"Why--why! it's only one of those
horrid, blowzy, mushroom things. But
what's the noise--like--like somebody
rattling little marbles, dry peas?"

[[169]]

p168 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p169w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p170

v?