So ended the spectioneer's story, and so ended that Christmas dinner in the Doldrums, but both Kenneth and Archie long, long after this used to speak about it amid other scenes and in other climes, and both agreed it was one of the pleasantest afternoons ever they had spent in life. The two friends made many a voyage together in the _Brilliant_, and together came through no little adventure, and saw many a strange sight in many a strange sea. They came to love the vessel at last, for real sailors do love their ships. They loved her and called her the saucy _Brilliant_, and the dear old ship, and quite a host of other pet names. "But alas! and alas?" said Kenneth to Archie one day, while they stood together on the quarter-deck, "we are not making our fortunes. We will never get rich at sea. And by-and-bye, you know, we'll be getting fearfully old." "Yes," said Archie, "I'm feeling old already. We are both of us over twenty." "Sad thought! yes?" added Kenneth. "So I propose we leave the dear old stupid craft at the end of this voyage, Archie." And so they did, reader. And thus our tale runs on, but the scenes must change. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ End of Book Two. CHAPTER EIGHTEEN. ON THE UNKNOWN RIVER. "Most glorious night, Thou wert not sent for slumber! let me be A sharer in thy fierce and fair delight." Byron. Scene: Night on an unknown river, which, dark and deep and sluggish, is rolling onwards to the distant ocean through a wild and beautiful district in the interior, nay, but ill the very centre of Africa. The centre it may well be called, for it is near the equator, and hundreds of miles from the Indian Ocean. Night on the river, but not darkness. A round moon has risen, the clouds, dazzled by its splendour, have parted to let it pass; its light is flooding hill and dell and forest, and changing the river itself to--apparently--a moving flood of molten gold. Light, but not darkness. Night, but not silence either. Were it possible for any one to pass swiftly and unseen along the banks of the unknown river at such an hour and on such a night as this, what sights he would see, what sounds would fall upon his listening ear! Come with me in imagination! Take heed of those rocks; they are slippery at the edge, for the rainy season is not yet past. To fall into the stream would mean an ugly death, were you even as good a swimmer as the gallant Webb. There are no signs of life in the water, it is true, but the plash of your fall would raise a score of awful heads above it; the crocodiles would be upon you with lightning speed, and rend you from limb to limb. Peer over the cliff just there. What is that lying on the mud close by the river? Is it the trunk of some dead tree? Drop a pebble on it. See; it moves off into the river and slowly disappears--a crocodile.