Page:Iracéma, the honey-lips (1886).djvu/43
had scanty time to measure each other with the eye. When the first blow was being struck, Cauby and Iraçéma were between them.
In vain the daughter of Araken besought the Christian. Vainly did she throw her arms round him, endeavouring to withdraw him from the combat. On his side, Cauby as vainly strove to provoke Irapúam, and to draw upon himself the wrath of the chief.
At a sign from Irapúam, the warriors seized the brother and sister, and the combat began.
Suddenly the hoarse sound of the War-trumpet thundered through the forest. The sons of the Serra trembled as they recognised the boom of the Seashell and the War-cry of the Pytiguáras, those Lords of the Shores, which the fallen trees shade. The echo came from the Great Wigwam, which perhaps the enemy was at that moment attacking.
The warriors flew there, carrying with them their Chiefs. With the stranger only remained the daughter of Araken.
CHAPTER XI.
The Tabajára warriors, rushing to the Taba, awaited the enemy in part of the Caiçára or Curral.[1]
The foe not coming, they went forth to seek him.
They beat the forests all around and scoured the plains. There was no trace of the Pytiguáras; yet the well-known War-boom of the Shell from the shores had sounded in the ears of the mountain braves. Of this none doubted.
Irapúam suspected that it was a stratagem of the daughter of Araken to save the stranger, and he went
- ↑ Caiçara, from cai, a bit of burnt wood, and the desinence çara, what is or is made. "What is made of burnt wood," i.e., a strong enclosure of pointed stakes—a Curral.