But I was not going to allow myself to be frightened or discouraged by dwelling upon stories of that kind; I was feeling so far better that the desire to live had returned to me.  I even experienced some slight sensation of hunger, and there was no doubt at all as to the fact that I was parched with thirst.  I therefore turned to the savage who was flourishing the steering paddle and, first pointing to my open mouth, went through the motions of raising a vessel to it and drinking.  The man evidently understood me, for he shouted a few--to me quite unintelligible--words, whereupon one of the paddlers about the centre of the canoe laid in his paddle for a few moments, did something dexterous with a spear and a brownish-grey object the size of a man's head, and a minute later my lips were glued to a luscious cocoa-nut, the extremity of which had been deftly struck off with the blade of the spear, disclosing the white-lined hollow of the cup within brimming with a full pint or more of the delicious "milk," which I swallowed to the last drop.  Then, breaking off a strip of the husk and using it as a spoon, I proceeded to scrape out and hungrily devour the soft creamy fruit that lined the shell, and thus made the most satisfying and enjoyable meal that had passed my lips for many a day.  Shortly afterward, the strength of the ebb current increasing so greatly that we were able to make scarcely any headway against it, our steersman headed the canoe in toward the western bank of the river, and we presently entered a narrow creek up which we passed for a distance of about a quarter of a mile until we reached a practicable landing-place, when the canoe was secured to a stout mangrove root, and all hands stepped out of her, the steersman taking the precaution to draw my attention to the spears and bows and arrows with which his party were armed, as a hint, I suppose, of what I might expect should I be foolish enough to attempt to escape. We pushed our way through the thick bush for a distance of about a hundred yards, and then reached a small open space, where we bivouacked; a party of ten disappearing into the bush, while the rest remained to kindle a fire and, evidently, to look after me and make sure that I did not give them the slip.  At length, after the lapse of about half an hour, the party who had vanished into the bush returned, singly or by two's and three's, some bringing in a monkey or two, others a few brace of parrots, one man a big lizard like an iguana, another a fine deer, until each of the ten had contributed something to the common larder, when the fire was made up, a plentiful supply of food cooked, and all hands set to with a will, each apparently animated by a determination to show all the others how much solid food he was capable of putting out of sight at a sitting.  They very civilly offered me a choice of their dainties, and I accepted a tolerably substantial venison steak, broiled over the fire by being suspended close over the glowing embers upon the end of a stick.  Off this I contrived to make a fairly hearty meal, after which, following the example of the others, I stretched myself out in the long grass under the shadow of a big bush, and quickly fell into a deep sleep.