“The forest was better than this,” thought McEwen; “there I would not die of the heat, anyhow, and I might find food. Here is nothing,” and he turned and glanced about for a sight of the jungle whence he had come. Far to the left and rear of him he saw it, those great up-standing swords. As he gazed, revolving in his troubled mind whether he should return or not, he saw another like himself hurrying toward him out of the distance. He eagerly hailed the newcomer, who was yet a long way off. “What is it?” asked the other, coming up rapidly. “Do you know where I can get something to eat?” “Is that why you called me?” he answered, eyeing him angrily. “Do you ask in time of famine? Certainly not. If I had anything for myself, I would not be out here. Go and hunt for it like the rest of us. Why should you be asking?” “I have been hunting,” cried McEwen, his anger rising. “I have searched here until I am almost starved.” “No worse off than any of us, are you?” said the other. “Look at me. Do you suppose I am feasting?” He went off in high dudgeon, and McEwen gazed after him in astonishment. The indifference and sufficiency were at once surprising and yet familiar. Later he found himself falling rapidly into helpless lassitude from both hunger and heat, when a voice, as of one in pain, hailed him. “Ho!” it cried. “Hello!” he answered. “Come, come!” was the feeble reply. McEwen started forward at once. When he was still many times his own length away he recognized the voice as that of his testy friend of a little while before, but now sadly changed. He was stretched upon the earth, working his mandibles feebly. “What is it?” asked McEwen solicitously. “What ails you? How did this happen?” “I don’t know,” said the other. “I was passing along here when that struck me,” indicating a huge boulder. “I am done for, though. You may as well have this food now, since you are one of us. The tribe can use what you do not eat,” he sighed. “Oh, nothing of the sort,” said McEwen solicitously, the while he viewed the crushed limbs and side of the sufferer. “You’ll be all right. Why do you speak of death? Just tell me where to take you, or whom to go for.” “No,” said the other, “it would be no use. You see how it is. They could do nothing for me. I did not want your aid. I merely wanted you to have this food here. I shall not want it now.” “Don’t say that,” returned McEwen. “You mustn’t talk about dying. There must be something I can do. Tell me. I don’t want your food.” “No, there isn’t anything you could do. There isn’t any cure, you know that. Report, when you return, how I was killed. Just leave me now and take that with you. They need it, if you do not.”