About three o'clock in the afternoon
They glared at each other in mutual defiance , while all round rose the distant whisper , `` We will kill you -- we will kill you if we can . '' That night we moored our canoes with heavy stones for anchors in the center of the stream , and made every preparation for a possible attack . Nothing came , however , and with the dawn we pushed upon our way , the drum-beating dying out behind us . About three o'clock in the afternoon we came to a very steep rapid , more than a mile long -- the very one in which Professor Challenger had suffered disaster upon his first journey . I confess that the sight of it consoled me , for it was really the first direct corroboration , slight as it was , of the truth of his story . The Indians carried first our canoes and then our stores through the brushwood , which is very thick at this point , while we four whites , our rifles on our shoulders , walked between them and any danger coming from the woods . Before evening we had successfully passed the rapids , and made our way some ten miles above them , where we anchored for the night .