The Indian disappeared behind a thick curtain of bush and creeper, and was followed by one of his friends, who stood on the bank within sight; while the other two remained in the boat, standing like beautiful copper statues, their bows bent, their eyes fixed on the trees or the bank. After a little rustling behind this natural curtain, there came the sharp click of a flint and, a little later, the crackling of burning grass; but not till a great burst of smoke arose, followed by a roaring flare, did the other Indians drop their weapons. "That will keep the jaguars away," said one of them. "They come down to drink just about this time." "Were you afraid that one of them might spring out on your comrade?" asked Mansfield. "Who knows? It is not only they that have to be guarded against. Do you hear that noise? That is a puma; ocelots sometimes will spring upon us from a tree; a tapir will attack us if her young one is with her. And what of the snakes and the alligators?" "Then why land at all for sleeping?" The Indians shivered. "Have you never heard of water-boas? The Paraguay is full of them; by day they rarely come up; but at night! Come; our fire is big now; we are going to moor the boat and land." When he got ashore, the traveller found that a whole bush formed the substance of the fire; a little dry grass had been laid to the windward side of it, and the bush, being of a resinous nature, soon flared up like an oil-barrel. The fire-maker was returning from collecting fuel, and had both arms full of fallen wood, with which he banked up a solid fire before the bush could roar itself out. The Englishman had his own opinion on the wisdom of lighting fires in such overgrown spots, and was not surprised when, during that river journey, they passed many patches--some over a hundred acres in extent--where almost every tree had been consumed by some recent conflagration. "So there are water-serpents here, are there?" he asked as they seated themselves as near to the fire as was consistent with comfort. "Yes; some of them thirty feet long, or even forty. They will sometimes upset a whole canoe, or will lift a man out of his seat and drag him to the bottom." This may or may not be an Indian exaggeration, but it is certainly a fact that the anaconda and his many brethren in the Paraguay make no trouble of carrying off a calf or small deer that has come down to drink. "To-morrow we must kill something," said another Indian as he unwrapped a slab of _carne seca_, or dried beef, from a strip of grass matting. "This is all that is left. See after the water, one of you."