The Mysteries of the Court of London — page 306: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

THE TIGER 277 the victorious rhinoceros, drawing back for an instant, rushed forward and inflicted another hideous ripping wound. The Burker meanwhile had been gazing with indescribable feelings of mingled awe and horror, but he now tarried to behold no more, for he dreaded lest the conquering brute should seek him as another victim. He plunged farther and farther into the jungle, his brain dizzy with the idea of all the horrors that surrounded him, and lost in an appalling wonderment as to what new spectacle might suddenly burst upon his view. He drew near a forest which stretched far as the eye could reach upon his right hand, and if he had been skilled in the vegetable history of Hindustan, he would have known that it was an immense assemblage of those superb teak-trees which rival the British oak in the building of ships. Avoiding the forest as much as possible, on account of the double perils of boa-constrictors and Stranglers, the Burker turned away to the left, and another hour’s journey brought him to a new scene of verdure. Here towering palm-trees were laden with their fruit, — that fruit which he could not reach; but he beheld countless monkeys running up the stems and playing amongst the branches. Mangoes were there growing in wild abundance, but the Burker dared not eat of them, for he was afraid of being poisoned. Pepper-vines and cardamom-plants were richly interspersed around; the plantain and the jack were likewise flourishing there. The beams of the vertical sun were now fraught with so intense a sultriness that the Burker would have given worlds to be enabled to seek some grateful shade, but for the rea- sons above set forth he dared not. He was athirst, for since he had left his cavern he had found no pool nor stream with whose waters he might moisten his feverish lips. He dragged himself painfully along, but in another half-hour he reached a broad stream. Here he sat down to slake his thirst and bathe his feet, but scarcely had he taken off his Shoes, when a long, terrific head was thrust up above the surface of the water at a little distance, and the gaping jaws showed frightul ranges of teeth. With a cry, a perfect yell of agony, which resounded through those wilds, the Burker started up to his feet, snatched up his shoes, and darted away. On glancing back, he beheld a tremendous alligator emerge from the river, and more quickly sped the GOMIIGDOG SS) CO: