Immediately
the water became agitated, and an enormous eel thrust its head above
the surface and allowed the youth to touch it. It was about twelve feet
long, and as thick round the body as a man's thigh.
"There!" said Bill, his lip curling with contempt; "what do you think
of that for a god, Ralph? This is one o' their gods, and it has been
fed with dozens o' livin' babies already. How many more it'll get afore
it dies is hard to say."
"Babies!" said I, with an incredulous look.
"Ay, babies," returned Bill. "Your soft-hearted folk at home would say,
'Oh, horrible! impossible!' to that, and then go away as comfortable
and unconcerned as if their sayin' 'Horrible! impossible!' had made it
a lie. But I tell you, Ralph, it's a _fact_. I've seed it with my
own eyes the last time I was here, an' mayhap if you stop a while at
this accursed place, and keep a sharp look-out, you'll see it too. They
don't feed it regularly with livin' babies, but they give it one now
and then as a treat. Bah, you brute!" cried Bill in disgust, giving the
reptile a kick on the snout with his heavy boot that sent it sweltering
back in agony into its loathsome pool. I thought it lucky for Bill,
indeed for all of us, that the native youth's back happened to be
turned at the time; for I am certain that if the poor savages had come
to know that we had so rudely handled their god, we should have had to
fight our way back to the ship.
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