of the serpent.
Sree, however, undertook to do this himself, telling his men to refill the brass vessels to sluice down the bamboo stage.
But instead of thrusting the repulsive-looking reptile off, he stopped, thinking for a few moments.
"What is it?" said Phra; "why don't you throw that nasty thing in to be swept out to sea?"
Sree gave him a peculiar look, and turned to Harry.
"Was it a very big crocodile, Sahib?" he said.
"Yes. Why?"
"Would you like to have a shot at it?"
"Of course; but these big ones are so cunning."
"Let's see," said the man. "Perhaps I could get you a shot."
The boys were interested at once.
"What are you going to do?" said Phra.
"See if I can bring one up where you can shoot."
"How?" asked Harry.
"Is there a big hook in the house?" said Sree.
"Do you want one?"
"Yes, Sahib."
"Go up, then, and tell Mike to give you one of the biggest meat-hooks.
Say I want it directly, and then he will."
The two men squatted down at the end of the landing-place, smiling, behind their vessels of water, as Sree hurried up the garden, while the two boys stood, gun in hand, scanning the surface of the river.
"He's going to make a bait of the snake, I suppose; but I don't expect the croc will be about here now. If the water were clear we could see."
But, as before said, the stream was flowing of a rich coffee or chocolate hue, deeply laden as it was with the fine mud of the low flats so often flooded after rains in the mountains, and it was impossible to see a fish, save when now and then some tiny, silvery scrap of a thing sprang out, to fall back with a splash.
"We're only going to make ourselves hot for nothing," said Harry. "I don't believe we shall see the beast. Now, if you had been here when I saw him."
"And both of us had had guns," said Phra. "What nonsense it is to talk like that! One never is at a place at the right time."
"Fortunately for the crocs," said Harry, laughing. "Here he is."
"What, the croc?" cried Phra, cocking his gun.
"No, no; Sree. – Got it?"
"Yes, Sahib. A good big one."
The man came on to the landing-stage, smiling, with the bright new double hook in his hand and a stout piece of string. Then taking down a little coil of rope used for mooring boats at one of the posts, he thrust one of the hooks through the hemp, bound it fast with string, leaving a long piece after knotting off, and then passed the other hook well through the vertebrae and muscles behind the snake's head, using the remaining string to bind the shank of the hook firmly to the serpent's neck so as to strengthen the hold.
There were about twenty yards of strong rope, and Sree fastened the other end of this to the post used to secure the boats, before looking up at the boys.
"Large big fishing," he said, with a dry smile. "Fish too strong to hold."
"And that's rather a big worm to put on the hook," said Harry, laughing. "There, throw it out, and let's see if we get a bite. Are you going to fish, Phra?"
"No," said the Prince; "I am going to shoot. You can hold the line."
"Thankye, but I'm going to fish too. Throw out, Sree."
The old hunter's throwing out was to push one end of the serpent off the end of the bamboo stage, with the result that the rest glided after it, and with their guns at the ready the two boys waited to see if there was a rush made at the bait as it disappeared beneath the muddy stream.
But all they saw was a gleam or two of the white part of the serpent, as it rolled over and over, then went down, drawing the rope slowly out till the last coil had gone; and then nothing was visible save a few yards of rope going down from the post into the water, and rising and falling with the action of the current.
Sree squatted down by the post and went on chewing his betel, his two men by the brass vessels doing the same.
So five, ten, fifteen minutes passed away, with the boys watching, ready to fire if there was a chance.
"Oh, I say, this is horribly stupid," cried Harry at last. "Let's give it up."
"No," said Phra; "you want patience to fish for big things as well as for little. You have no patience at all."
"Well, I'm not a Siamese," said Harry, laughing. "We English folk are not always squatting down on our heels chewing nut and pepper-leaf, and thinking about nothing."
"Neither am I," said Phra; "but I have patience to wait."
"It is your nature to," said Harry. "You're all alike here; never in a hurry about anything."
"Why should we be?" replied Phra quietly. "We could not in a hot country like ours. You always want to be in a hurry to do something else. Look at Sree and his men; see how they wait."
"Yes, I suppose they're comfortable; but I'm not. I want to go and lie down under a tree. Think it's any good, Sree? Won't come, will he?"
"Who can say, Sahib?" replied the man. "He ought to if he is about here. That bait is big and long; the bait must go far down the stream, and it smells well."
"Smells well, eh?" said Harry.
"Beautiful for a bait, Sahib. You are sure you saw one this morning?"
"Saw it, and hit it a fine crack with a big stone."
"Then he ought to be there and take that bait; and he will, too, if you have not offended him by making his back too sore."
"Offended him! Made his back too sore!" said Harry, with a chuckle. "What a rum old chap you are, Sree! You talk about animals just as if they felt and thought as we do."
"Yes, Sahib, and that is what the bonzes teach. They say that when people die they become crocodiles, or elephants, or birds, or serpents, or monkeys, or some other kind of creature."
"And that's all stuff and nonsense, Sree. You don't believe all that,
I know."
"It's what I was taught, Sahib," said the man, with a queer twinkle of the eye.
"But you don't believe it, Sree. You don't think that some one turned when he died into that old snake, or else you wouldn't have caught it to sell to my father as a specimen."
"And then skinned it and made a bait of it on a hook to catch a crocodile," said Phra.
"Not he. Look at him," cried Harry. "See how he's laughing in his sleeve."
"He isn't. Hasn't got any sleeves."
"Well,
