As the tropic sun sunk slowly in the west, a thin miasma of mist began to curl upward from the still, silent pool around which the mangroves lifted their gnarled trunks on fantastic stilt-like roots from the slime of the swamp. At one spot, in vivid contrast to the sombre desolation around, a spray of orchids sprang like a flame from a gaunt, low-hanging branch, and mirrored their scarlet beauty in the ebony surface of the water below. Nothing moved; the scene was as lifeless as a picture. Even the air, heavy with the stench of decay and corruption, was still; it hung like a tangible substance over the place and endowed its primeval loneliness with an atmosphere of sinister foreboding.
In the deep shade at the edge of the lagoon, its nose almost touching a rank growth of purple-blotched f
