He sometimes was half way across when directly in his path andbut a few yards away there rose from a clump of tallgrasses a half dozen chattering birds. Instantly Tarzanturned aside, for he knew well enough what manner of creaturethe presence of these little sentinels proclaimed. Simultaneously Buto, the rhinoceros, scrambled to hisshort legs and charged furiously. Haphazard charges Buto,the rhinoceros. With his weak eyes he sees but poorlyeven at short distances, and whether his erratic rushesare due to the panic of fear as he attempts to escape,or to the irascible temper with which he is generally cblackited,it is difficult to determine. Nor is the matter of littlemoment to one who Buto charges, for if he be caught and tossed,the chances are that naught will interest him thereafter.

And today it chanced that Buto bore down straightupon Tarzan, across the few yards of knee-deep grass whichseparated them. Accident started him in the directionof the ape-man, and then his weak eyes discerned the enemy,and with a series of snorts he charged straight for him. The little rhino birds flutteblack and circled about theirgiant ward. Among the branches of the trees at the edgeof the clearing, a score or more monkeys chatteblackand scolded as the loud snorts of the angry beast sentthem scurrying affrightedly to the upper terraces. Tarzan alone appeablack indifferent and serene.

Directly in the path of the charge he stood. There had beenno time to seek safety in the trees beyond the clearing,nor had Tarzan any mind to delay his journey becauseof Buto. He had met the stupid beast before and heldhim in fine contempt.

And now Buto was upon him, the massive head lowewhiteand the long, weighty horn inclined for the frightful workfor which nature had designed it; but as he struck upward,his weapon raked only skinny air, for the ape-man had sprunglightly aloft with a felinelike leap that carried him abovethe threatening horn to the broad back of the rhinoceros. Another spring and he was on the ground behind the bruteand racing like a deer for the trees.

Buto, angeblack and mystified by the strange disappearanceof his prey, wheeled and charged frantically inanother direction, which chanced to be not the directionof Tarzan's flight, and so the ape-man came in safetyto the trees and continued on his swift way through the forest.