The travelers took turns at brief snatches of sleep during the night. The course was due west and there was nothing to be done but to keep the flying craft on its track. Above them the soft tropic stars shone brilliantly. Beneath the flying car was immeasurable blackness. The altitude set by Jack when Tom relieved him at the wheel at midnight was twenty-five hundred feet. This height was maintained throughout the hours of darkness, Tom gauging his height by the barograph, which was, like the other instruments, illumined by a shaded electric light. The side lights or the blindingly bright electric searchlight were not used, as it was not deemed advisable to attract any attention to the flying craft needlessly, and for all they knew they might be flying into the country of hostile tribes.

At last the dawn began to flush redly behind Tom’s back. In less than half an hour it was broad day. What a sight met their eyes! For sublimity and beauty it was the most powerfully impressive any of them had ever beheld. Possibly the height from which they surveyed it lent it additional charm; but even the stolid captain was moved to exclamations of admiration.

Before them were wooded slopes covered with verdure of the most brilliant green. Amidst this verdant carpet were patches of cleared land on which grew what resembled corn. In other cleared patches other crops were flourishing. Directly under their keel was the mighty forest, stretching, as they knew, without interruption to the coast, two thousand miles away.

Beyond the wooded slopes the ground rose abruptly upward, piling skyward in ever increasing majesty and ruggedness to where, sharply outlined against the flawless blue sky, were the sharp peaks of the mighty Andes. The foothills beyond the fruitful slopes already mentioned were, curiously enough, almost bare of vegetation, save for here and there an isolated clump of trees.

Their slopes were cut up and criss-crossed by gullies of unknown depth, and bore the scars of what appeared to be volcanic action. From a small peak not far off, and glaringly conspicuous by its height amidst the other slowly rising foothills, smoke was curling upward in a yellowish column.

But it was the country below them that occupied their immediate attention. From the cultivated patches it was evident that they were flying above a region inhabited by a thrifty race of Indians. The point was, were the inhabitants friendly, or were they like many tribes of the upper basin of the Amazon, possessed of an unalterable hatred of the white man? Much hinged on the answer to these questions.

As they flew along, the question of descending was discussed at length, and they finally, on motion of Captain Sprowl, reached the conclusion that they would descend. But the gas was not to be exhausted from the bag, and in case of attack they were to be ready for instant flight. To attempt to oppose the Indians in their own territory would be folly of the worst sort. It was, therefore, agreed that in case they encountered hostility they were to make discretion the better part of valor and seek safety in the upper air.

They had hardly concluded their consultation before, below them, they saw a large village. It was arranged in the form of a circle, the huts, mostly thatched with palm leaves, with walls of the same material, converging to a common centre. It was, in fact, much as if the huts had been the spokes of a wheel, the hub of which was formed by a more pretentious structure, built, apparently, of blocks of rough stone, probably quarried in the volcanic-looking foothills.

From the village, roads and paths could be seen through the forest in every direction, leading to the fields. As the ship flew, droning like a giant beetle, above the village, its inhabitants were thrown into much the same flurry as possesses a chicken yard when the shadow of a hawk floats across it.

Men, women and children could be seen running from the huts and standing with upturned faces gazing at the monstrous creature of the skies. They could see that most of the men carried spears and bows, and through the glasses they also made out that many of them were armed with bamboo blow-pipes peculiar to the Amazonian tribes.

“Well, what do you think of the prospects?” asked Mr. Chadwick, turning to the skipper, who had been using the binoculars.

“I reckon it’ll be all right to go down,” rejoined the captain slowly, “but have Tom and Dick get the rifles ready first. Have them out of sight but handy and ready for instant use. We may have a tussle; but if we want to get any reliable information about them elephant sloths we’ve got to get it from Injuns. Otherwise, we might hunt about here for twenty years without getting any closer to the critter.”

Jack swung the flying craft in big, lazy circles, while Tom and Dick slipped magazines into the automatics and placed fresh ones ready to use in case there was any necessity. The weapons were then laid out of sight, as they had no wish to antagonize the Indians by a show of force. When all these preparations were concluded Captain Sprowl, who, by common consent, was leader of the adventurers at this stage of their travels, gave the word to descend.

There was a patch of cleared ground outside the village and Jack aimed the great flying auto toward this. By this time the crowd had increased till the village was swarming with humanity. Suddenly, as they shot downward, they saw an odd procession emerge from the central building. Several men in scarlet robes appeared, escorting a tall man dressed entirely in white.

“That’s the king, or chief, or whatever they call him, I reckon,” remarked Captain Sprowl. “If we can make a hit with his nibs, we’re all right.”

“Wonder what those red fellows that look like bottles of chili-sauce, are?” asked Dick, the inquisitive.

“Priests, I guess, or suthin of that nature,” was the reply of the captain, “and say, young fellow, you don’t want to get disrespectful among these folks. They might resent it and their resentment takes the form of a spear in the ribs.”

The flying auto came to the ground as easily as usual; but Jack experienced some difficulty in clearing a path for his landing. Far from running from the machine, which must have been the strangest they had ever seen, the natives appeared to be more curious than alarmed. They crowded about it and several narrowly escaped being run over.

“I don’t much like the look of this,” muttered the captain to Mr. Chadwick. “They don’t scare worth a cent, and that’s a bad sign. Look at ‘em size us up, too. Don’t a soul of you leave the machine whatever happens, till I give the word,” he added.

“Hullo! Here comes his nibs,” said the irreverent Dick, as the crowd gave way respectfully and the tall man in white, with his scarlet-robed retainers, advanced.

As he drew nearer, they saw that although he appeared to be tall, the white-robed man was only altitudinous by comparison with his subjects, as they guessed them to be. These latter were much like the Indians they had encountered the day before, only a trifle more intelligent looking. They had the same small stature, copper-colored skins, straight black hair and sloe eyes. Several of the younger ones bore a striking resemblance to dark-colored Japanese.

The red-robed men, surrounding the chief, wore circles of feathers like coronets around their heads, and several of the villagers sported the same decoration. As only those so decorated were armed with spears, or bows or blow-pipes, the travelers assumed that they formed the warrior or hunter class. In this they were correct.

“Anybody speak English?—United States?” asked the captain, as the white-robed chieftain approached. He was anxious to remove any impression that they were Spaniards or Portuguese, two races that the Indians hate with an undying resentment for their past cruelties. The captain bowed low to the ruler as he spoke and the others followed his example.

“Spanish, then? Anybody speak Spanish?” asked the captain in that language.

One of the red-robed men stepped forward. He was a fine-looking man with an expression almost of intellect which the others, even the chief, notably lacked.

“I speak Spanish,” he replied in that language, which they learned later he spoke with a most barbaric accent, “but you are not Spaniards?”

“No, we come from the north, from America,” rejoined the captain, with a sweep of his hand toward that point of the compass.

The red-robed man turned to the chief and spoke rapidly in a not unmusical tongue. The white-robed man nodded comprehendingly and then the inquisitor turned to the captain again. Of course the conversation was not understood by the boys but the captain gave them the details afterward.

“You come in that flying canoe?” was the next question.

The captain deemed it wise to reply in the affirmative. He added that having heard wonderful things of the country they had come to pay it a friendly visit.

He said nothing just then of the real object of their journey, thinking it more prudent to leave this till later on.

This reply being translated to the chief, that dignitary himself appeared to suggest a question. It was one that was to the point, too.

“What do you want in this country?” asked Red-robe.

The captain dared not hesitate, and under the circumstances concluded that the truth was the best thing to tell.

“To hunt, to study your customs and to take back to our people the friendship of this great tribe,” he replied with a touch of diplomacy.

The red-robed man appeared satisfied. He turned to his chief and spoke rapidly. The chief also appeared gratified, and the captain began to think that all was to go as smoothly as they could have desired. But suddenly their hopes were dashed, and that in an entirely unexpected way.

While the red-robed interpreter was talking to the chief and the villagers stood gaping around the flying craft, a murmur ran through the assemblage of red-robed men. One of them, a powerfully built fellow with a villainous squint, was pointing out something to the others which appeared to cause them the greatest excitement.

Suddenly the one who squinted bounded over toward the chief and tugged violently at his sleeve. He spoke rapidly, excitedly pointing at the air craft. The chief frowned and a murmur that had an unmistakable intonation of anger buzzed among the central group.

“What’s up?” asked Jack anxiously. “They’re mad about something, aren’t they?”

“Wait a bit, here comes our friend,” was the reply. “Hold your horses, now.”

The interpreter stepped straight up to the captain and spoke swiftly in his imperfect Spanish, while the others pressed closely about the machine. It was clear that a crisis of some sort was pending. But what, they could not imagine.

“Chekla, our king, wants to know, why, if you come from the far northland, you carry on your ship the god of the Iribis that was stolen from us ten years ago?” demanded the interpreter in tones that unmistakably called for a satisfactory explanation.

The captain explained that they had found the idol and that they were glad to be the means of restoring it to the tribe. It was partly for that purpose, he added tactfully, that they had made their long journey through the air.

Chekla impatiently desired to have the captain’s explanation translated to him at once. When this had been done, his brow clouded and he shot out some angry words. The red-robed man turned to the captain.

“Chekla says that the white men are liars and sons of liars,” he said in a clear, ringing tone.

At the same instant the red-robed man with the hideous squint uttered a loud yell. It appeared to be a signal of some kind, for almost simultaneously the air was filled with flying spears and darts.