At the head of the dismal march went Grom, with his mate A-ya, and her two children, and the hairy little scout Loob, whose feet were as quick as his eyes and ears and nostrils, and whose sinews were as untiring as those of the gray wolf. Immediately behind these came the main body of the warriors, on a wide line so as to guard against surprise on the flank. Then followed the women and children, bunched as closely as possible behind the center of the line; and a knot of picked warriors, under young Mo, the brother of A-ya, guarded the rear. There were no old men and women, all these having gone down in the last great battle at the Caves, selling their lives as dearly as possible to cover the retreat. Such of the young women as had no small children to carry bore the heavy burdens of the fire-baskets, or bundles of smoke-dried meat, leaving the warriors free to use their bows and spears. In traversing the swamp the march was sometimes at ground-level, sometimes high in the tree-tops. In the tree-tops it was safer, but the progress was slow and laborious. At ground-level the swarms of stinging insects were always with them, till Grom invented the use of smudges. When every alternate member of the tribe carried a torch of dry grass and half-green bark, the march was enveloped in a cloud of acrid smoke, which the insects found more or less disconcerting. Of the grave perils of this weary march to the hills a single instance may suffice. The nights, as a rule, were passed by the whole tribe in the tree-tops, both for the greater security, and because there was seldom enough dry ground to sleep upon. But one evening, toward sunset, they came upon a sort of little island in the reeking jungle. Its surface was four or five feet above the level of the swamp. The trees which dotted it were smooth, straight, towering shafts with wide fans of foliage at their far-off tops. And the ground between these clean, symmetrical trunks was unencumbered, being clothed only with a rich, soft, spicy-scented herbage, akin to the thymes and mints. Such an opportunity for rest and refreshment was not to be let slip, and Grom ordered an immediate halt. A fat, pig-like water beast, of the nature of the dugong, had been speared that day in a bayou beside the line of march, and with great contentment the tribe settled themselves down to such a comfortable feasting as they had not known for many days. While the fat dugong was being hacked to pieces and divided under the astute direction of A-ya, Grom made haste to establish the camp-fires in a chain completely encircling the encampment, as a protection against night-prowlers from the surrounding jungle. As darkness fell the flames lit up the soaring trunks, but the roof of the over-arching foliage was so high that the smoky illumination was lost in it.