Off into the forest I went, feeling a boyish elation to be so free nortaking heed or count of the reckless adventure before me. The Martianweather for the moment was lovely and the many-coloured grass lush andsoft under foot. Mile after mile I went, heeding the distance lightly, theair was so elastic. Now pressing forward as the main interest of myerrand took the upper hand, and remembrance of poor Heru like a crushedwhite flower in the red grip of those cruel ravishers came upon me, andthen pausing to sigh with pleasure or stand agape--forgetful even of her--inwonder of the unknown loveliness about me.
And well might I stare! Everything in that forest was wonderful!
There were plants which turned from colour to colour with the varyinghours of the day. While others had a growth so swift it was dangerous tosit in their neighbour- hood since the long, succulent tendrils clamberingfrom the parent stem would weave you into a helpless tangle while yougazed, fascinated, upon them. There were plants that climbed andwalked; sighing plants who called the winged things of the air to themwith a noise so like to a girl sobbing that again and again I stopped in thetangled path to listen. There were green bladder-mosses which swamabout the surface of the still pools like gigantic frog-broods. There wereon the ridges warrior trees burning in the vindictiveness of a longforgotten cause--a blaze of crimson scimitar thorns from root to topmosttwig; and down again in the cool hollows were lady-bushes makingtwilight of the green gloom with their cloudy ivory blos- soms and fillingthe shadows with such a heavy scent that head and heart reeled with fatalpleasure as one pushed aside their branches. Every river-bed was full ofmighty reeds, whose stems clattered together when the wind blew likeswords on shields, and every now and then a bit of forest was woventogether with the ropey stems of giant creepers till no man or beast couldhave passed save for the paths which constant use had kept open throughthe mazes.
All day long I wandered on through those wonderful woodlands, andin fact loitered so much over their infinite marvels that when sundown came all too soon there was still undulating forest everywhere, vistas offairy glades on every hand, peopled with incredible things and echoingwith sounds that excited the ears as much as other things fascinated theeyes, but no sign of the sea or my fishing village anywhere.
It did not matter; a little of the Martian leisureliness was getting intomy blood: "If not today, why then tomorrow," as An would have said; andwith this for comfort I selected a warm, sandy hollow under the roots of abig tree, made my brief arrangements for the night, ate some honey cakes,and was soon sleeping blissfully.
I woke early next morning, after many hours of interrupted dreams,and having nothing to do till the white haze had lifted and made it possibleto start again, rested idly a time on my elbow and watched the sunshinefilter into the recesses.
Very pretty it was to see the thick canopy overhead, by star-light soimpenetrable, open its chinks and fissures as the searching sun came uponit; to see the pin-hole gaps shine like spangles presently, the spacesbroaden into lesser suns, and even the thick leafage brighten and shinedown on me with a soft sea-green radiance. The sunward sides of thetree-stems took a glow, and the dew that ran dripping down their mossysides trickled blood-red to earth. Else- where the shadows were stillblack, and strange things began to move in them--things we in our middle-aged world have never seen the likeness of: beasts half birds, birds halfcreeping things, and creeping things which it seemed to me passed throughlesser creations down to the basest life that crawls without interruption ordivision.
It was not for me, a sailor, to know much of such things, yet some Icould not fail to notice. On one grey branch overhead, jutting from atree-stem where a patch of velvet moss made in the morning glint a fairybed, a won- derful flower unfolded. It was a splendid bud, ivory white,cushioned in leaves, and secured to its place by naked white roots thatclipped the branch like fingers of a lady's hand. Even as I looked it opened,a pale white star, and hung pensive and inviting on its mossy cushion.
From it came such a ravishing odour that even I, at the further end of thegreat scale of life, felt my pulses quicken and my eyes brighten with cupidity. I was in the very act of climbing the tree, but before I couldmove hand or foot two things happened, whether you take my word forthem or no.
Firstly, up through a glade in the underwood, attracted by the odour,came an ugly brown bird with a capacious beak and shining claws. Heperched near by, and peeped and peered until he made out the flowerpining on her virgin stem, whereat off he hopped to her branch and there,with a cynical chuckle, strutted to and fro between her and the main stemlike an ill genius guarding a fairy princess.
Surely Heaven would not allow him to tamper with so chaste a bud!
My hand reached for a stone to throw at him when happened the secondthing. There came a gentle pat upon the woodland floor, and from a treeoverhead dropped down another living plant like to the one above yet notexactly similar, a male, my instincts told me, in full sol- itary blossom likeher above, cinctured with leaves, and supported by half a score of thickwhite roots that worked, as I looked, like the limbs of a crab. In atwinkling that parti-coloured gentleman vegetable near me was off to thestem upon which grew his lady love; running and scram- bling, draggingthe finery of his tasselled petals behind, it was laughable to watch hiseagerness. He got a grip of the tree and up he went, "hand over hand,"root over root. I had just time to note others of his species had droppedhere and there upon the ground, and were hurry- ing with frantic haste tothe same destination when he reached the fatal branch, and was straddlingvictoriously down it, blind to all but love and longing. That ill-omenedbird who stood above the maiden-flower let him come within a stalk'slength, so near that the white splendour of his sleeping lady gleamedwithin arms' reach, then the great beak was opened, the great claws made aclutch, the gal- lant's head was yanked from his neck, and as it wenttumbling down the maw of the feathered thing his white legs fell spinningthrough space, and lay knotting them- selves in agony upon the ground fora minute or two before they relaxed and became flaccid in the repose ofdeath. An- other and another vegetable suitor made for that fatal tryst,and as each came up the snap of the brown bird's beak was all theirobsequies. At last no more came, and then that Nemesis of claws and quills walked over to the girl-flower, his stomach feathers ruffled withrepletion, the green blood of her lovers dripping from his claws, andpulled her golden heart out, tore her white limbs one from the other, andswallowed her piecemeal before my very eyes! Then up in wrath Ijumped and yelled at him till the woods echoed, but too late to stay hissacrilege.
By this time the sun was bathing everything in splendour, and turningaway from the wonders about me, I set off at best pace along the well-trodden path which led without turning to the west coast village where thecanoes were.
It proved far closer than expected. As a matter of fact the forest inthis direction grew right down to the water's edge; the salt-loving treesactually overhanging the waves--one of the pleasantest sights in nature-and thus I came right out on top of the hamlet before there had been anindication of its presence. It occupied two sides of a pretty little bay, thethird side being flat land given over to the cultivation of an enormousspecies of gourd whose characteristic yellow flowers and green, succulentleaves were discernibl............