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The Man-eating Tree

The Man-eating Tree image
Parent Issue
Day
16
Month
February
Year
1883
Copyright
Public Domain
OCR Text

"Many years ago I turned my resfcle.ss stops towards central África and made the jouruey from where the Senegal empties itself into the Atlantic to the Nile, skirting the great desert and reaching Nubia on my way to the eastern coast. I had with me three nativo atiéndante - two of them brothers, the third, Otoña, a young savage from Gaboon uplands, a mere lad in his teens - and one day leaving my mule with the two men, who were pitching my tent for the night, went on with my gun, the boy accompanying [me, towards a fern forest whicn I saw in the distance. As I approached it I found the forest cut in two by a wide glade, and seeing a small herd of the common antelope, an excellent beast in the pot, browsing their way along the shaded side, I crept after them. Though ignorant of their real danger, the herd was suspicious, and, slowly trotting before me, enticed nie a milo or more along the verge of the fern growths. Turning a corner I snddenly becamc aware of a solitary tree growing in the middle of the glade -one tree alone. It stmck me at onee that I had never seen a tree just like it before; but bcing intent upon venison for my eupper, I looked at it only long cnough to satisfy my surprise at seeing a single plant of such rich growth flourishing in a spot where only the harsh fern canes seemed to thrive. The deer, meanwhile, were midway between me and the tree, but suddenly, instead of passing it, swerved in their career and swept around it at some yards distance. Was I mad, or did the plant really try to catch the deer? On a sudden I saw, or thought I saw, Ihe troe violently agitated. and wliilc the ferns all around me were standing motionless in the dead even ing air, its boughs were swayed by some sudden gust toward tin; herd, and swept by the force of their impulse almost to the ground. I drew my hand across my eyes, closed them for a moment and looked again. The tree was as motionless as rnyself! "Toward it, and now close to il, the boy was running in excited pursuit of the fawn. Ho stretched out his hands to cateh it. It bounded from his eager grasp. Aaiu ho stretched forward, and again it escaped him. Thero was another rush forward, and the next instant boy and deer were bcneath the tree. And now there was no mistake what I saw. The tree was convulsed with motion, leanert forward, swept its tUick foliage boughs to the ground, and enveloped from my sight purser and pursued. I was witliin a hundred yards, and the cry of Otóna from the inidst of the tree came to me in all the elearness of its, agony. There was then one stifled, strangling scream, and except for the agitation of the leaves where they closed upon the boy there was not a sign of life. "I called out, 'Otona!' No answer carne. I tried to cali out again, but my utterancewas like that of some wild beast smitten at once with sudden terror and its death wound. I stood there, changed from all semblance of a human being. Not all the terrors of the earth together could have made me take my eye from the awful plant, or my foot off the ground. I must have stood thus for half an hour, for the shadows had crept out from the forest half across the glade before the hideous paroxysm of í'ear loft me. My íirst impulse then was to creep slowly away, lest the tree should perecive me, but my returning reason iade me approacli it. The boy might have fallen into the lair of some wild beast of prey. "The vegetable lirst discovered ruy presence at about 50 yards distance. I then became aware of a stealthy motion among the thick-lipped leaves, reminding me of some wild beast slowly gathertug itself up from a long sleep, a vast coil of snakes in restless motion. "Was I bewildered by terror? Had my senses abandoned me in my need? 1 knew not - but the tree seemed .to to me to bc alive. Leuning over toward me, it seemed to be pulling up by its roots from the softened ground and to be moving toward me. 'Á mountainous monster, with myriad lips, murnblinotogether for life, was upon me! Like one who desperately defends himself from imminent death, I made an effort for lite a.nd fired my gun at the approaching horror. To my dizzied senses the sound seemed f ar 'off, but the shock of the recoil partially reealled me to myself, and starting back I reloaded. The shot had torn their way into the soft body of the great thing. The trunk, as it received the wound, shuddered, and the whole tree was struck with a sudden quiv.er. A fruit feil down, slipping from the leaves, now rigid with swollen veins, as from cavern foliage. Then I saw a large arm slowly drop! and, without a sound, it was severedfrom the juice-fattened bole, and sank down noiselessly through the glistening leaves. I fired again, and another vilo fragment was powerless - dead. At each discharge the terrible vegetation yieldcd n. life. Piecemeal 1 attacked it, killing here a leaf and there a branch. My furj' increased with the slaughter till,when my ammunition was oxhausted, the splendid giant was left a wreck-as if some hurricano had torn through it. On the ground lay lieaped together the fragmenta, struggling, rising and falling, gasping. Over them drooped in dying languor a fewstrickeu boughs, whife in the midst stood driplit)ir af every joint, the glistening trunk. "My continued firing had brought up one of my men on my mule. He dared not (so he told me) come near me, thinking me mad. I had now drawn my hunting-knife, and with this was lighting- with the leaves. Yes, but oiich leaf was instinct with a horridlifo; and more than once I feit ruy hand entiingled for a moment and seized as if by shavp lips. Ignorant of the presence of my eompanion I made a rush forward over the fallen foliage, and with a last paroxysm of frenzy drove my knife up lo the handle into the soft bole, and slipping on the fast congealing sap feil exliausted and uneonscious among the still' panting leaves. "My eompanion carried me back to 2amp, and after vainly searching for 3tona, awaited my return to ' ness. Two or three hours elapsed betore I could speak and several days before I could approach the terrible thing. My men would not go near it. It was uite dead, for as we came up a great )illed bird with gaudy plumago that ' ïad been securely teasting on the decayng fruit flew up from among tbe wreek. üVe removed the rotting foliage and thero irnong tho dead leaves, stilllimpidwith juicos and pfled round tlie roots, we found thc ghaslly relies of maay meáis, nd- its last nourishment- thc corase í little Otoña. To have removed the teaves would have taken too long, so we burieil tbc body as it was, with 100 vampiro leaves wtill clinging to it.

Article

Subjects
Ann Arbor Courier
Old News