It was that of a man in the prime of life--and wearing the head-ring. It was lying on its back, the throat upturned and protruding. And then Laurence shudderingly noticed two round gaping orifices at the base of the throat, clearly where the great nippers of the monster had punctured. The limbs, too, were scratched and scored as though with claws; and upon the dead face was such an awful expression of the very extremity of horror and dread as the spectator, accustomed as he was to such sights, had never beheld stamped on the human countenance before. And beholding it now, Laurence Stanninghame felt that the perspiration was oozing upon him at every pore, for he realized that he was looking upon a foresight of his own fate; for was he not that most perfectly and completely helpless of all God's creatures--an unarmed man! He had not so much as a stick or a pocket-knife to resist the onslaught of this blood-drinking monster--no, not even a boot, for it flashed across his mind at that moment that a good iron-shod heel might be better than nothing. He was wearing only a low-soled pair of ordinary _velschoenen_--hide shoes, to wit. There were not even stones lying about the ground, save very small ones, and he had no means of loosening rock slabs large enough to serve as weapons. There was no place of refuge to climb into afforded by ledges or pinnacles of rock, and even were there, why, the thing could surely come up after him as easily as the common tarantula could run up a wall. Nothing is more completely demoralizing than the helplessness of an unarmed man. With his Express--or his six-shooter--this one would have regarded the situation in the light of a wholly new and adventurous excitement--with even a large strong-bladed knife he would have been willing to take his chances. But he was totally unarmed. It seemed to Laurence that in that brief while he had lived a lifetime of mortal fear. Then with a mighty effort he pulled himself together. He would return to where he had left his stores ere commencing the exploration. Nobody ever yet improved a situation of peril by starving himself. Yet as he wended his way up the long chasm wherein he had first awakened to life, it was with a feeling of shuddering repulsion. The place bore such a close resemblance now to that other cave; yet here, at any rate, he knew there was nothing. He opened the corn baskets and the calabash of _amasi_, and made a fairly good meal. Then, by the glooming shades of the overhanging rock, he judged that daylight was waning. Out into the open once more--the open air might render such a life-and-death struggle with the monster a trifle less horrible than here, shut in by these tomb-like rock walls.