Just as we had left the bridge, Jack cried out, "Be quick! here is a strange beast with quills as long as my arm." The dogs ran, and I with them, and found a large Por-cu-pine in the grass. It made a loud noise, and shot out its quills at the dogs, and made them bleed. At this Jack put his hand to his belt, drew forth one of the small arms I gave him, and shot straight, with good aim, at the beast, which fell dead on the spot. Jack was proud of his feat, but Fritz, who did not like to be beat by one so young as Jack, told him to use more care, or he might shoot one of the dogs, if not one of us. My wife's first thought was to dress the wounds made by the quills, which had stuck in the nose of one of the dogs, while the boys made haste to pluck some of the quills from the skin of their strange prize.
At last our march came to an end, and I saw for the first time the great trees that my wife had told me of. They were of vast size, and were, I thought, fig trees. "If we can but fix our tent up there," I said, "we shall have no cause to dread, for no wild beasts can reach us." We sent Frank off to find sticks, with which to make a fire, and my wife made some soup of the flesh of the beast we had slain, though we did not like it so well as we did the ham and cheese we brought with us.
