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"Why, Malchus!" his comrades exclaimed as he entered the tent, "where have you been these two days? Why, you are splashed with blood. Where are Halcon and Chalcus?" "Dead," Malchus said "devoured by wolves." A cry of horror broke from the three young guardsmen. "`Tis too true," Malchus went on; "but give me food and wine.
"Divide the fire in four," Halcon said, "and pile the fuel in the centre; they will hardly dare to pass between the fires." The pack was now descending the slope, keeping up a chorus of howls and short yelps which sent a shiver of uneasiness through Malchus. As the wolves approached the spot the howling suddenly ceased.
There was a sound of snarling and growling; a cry of pain, a fierce struggle, and then a long continued snarling. "What are they doing?" Malchus asked with a shudder. "I believe they are eating their wounded comrade," Halcon replied. "I have heard such is the custom of the savage brutes. See, the carcasses of the other two have disappeared already."
The helmets, shields and arms of Halcon and Chalcus lay there, but not a remnant of their bones remained, and a few fragments of skin and some closely gnawed skulls alone testified to the wolves which had fallen in the encounter. The arms were gathered up, and the party returned to their camp, and the next day started for Carthagena for, after that experience, none cared for any further hunting.
After pushing on for two hours, Halcon, the eldest of the party, said: "I am by no means sure that we are going right after all. We have had a long day's work now, and I do not believe we shall find the camp tonight. I think we had better light a fire here and wrap ourselves in our cloaks. The fire will scare wild beasts away, and we shall be easily able to find the camp in the morning."
Ariete 0 0 26.1 Steel Rayo 0 0 25.5 Steel Azor 0 0 24.0 Steel Halcon 0 0 24.0 Steel Habana 0 0 21.3 Steel Barcelo 0 0 19.5 Steel Orion 0 0 21.5 Steel Retamosa 0 0 20.5 Steel Ordonez 0 0 20.1 Steel Ejercito 0 0 19.1 Steel Pollux 0 0 19.5 Steel Castor 0 0 19.0 Steel Aire 0 0 8.0 Steel NAME. Tonnage. Guns in Speed in Hull. Batteries. knots/hour.
"There is a tree over there," Malchus said, pointing to it, "with a bough but six feet from the ground. One spring on to that and we are safe." "Very well," Halcon assented; "we will attempt it at once before the fire burns low. Put your swords into your sheaths, sling your bows and arrows behind you, and take each a burning brand. These will be better weapons in such a case than swords or spears.
"Yes, and by the sound there must be a very large pack of them," Halcon agreed; "pile up the fire and set yourselves to gather more wood as quickly as possible; these beasts in large packs are formidable foes." The three men set to work, vigourously cutting down brushwood and lopping off small boughs of trees with their swords.
On the 24th, I began to experience the truth of what Captain Halcon had asserted, namely, that the existing charts were entirely worthless, and I also found that my native pilot was of no more value than they were, he had evidently passed the place before; but whether the size of the vessel, so much greater than any he had sailed in, confused him, or whether it was from his inability to understand and to make himself understood by us, he was of no use whatever, and we had the misfortune of running into shoal water, barely escaping the bottom.
"I did not think of it," Malchus said, "nor, I suppose, did the others. Halcon was our leader, and we did as he told us. He thought the fires would keep them off. Who could have thought the beasts would have ventured to attack us!" "I have always heard they were terrible," one of the others said; "but I should have thought that three armed men would have been a match for any number of them."
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