The leap must be made, and, gathering his muscles, he rose in the air, with his legs gathered under him, and with the certainty that the jump would far surpass the one that he had just witnessed.
In that critical moment, when his body rose and seemed suspended over the gorge, Jack's attention was fixed upon the strange actions of Fred.
The instant he landed he darted to one side, and with his rifle struck at something in the bushes which Jack could not see.

As he did so he recoiled, and was in the act of advancing and striking again, when Jack landed upon the ground beyond.
As he did so he heard a vicious, locust-like whir, whose meaning he recognized.

An immense rattlesnake was in the bushes, and Fred had descended almost upon it.

But for the tremendous effort of Jack he would have dropped squarely upon the velvety body, with consequences too frightful to be thought of; but his great leap carried him over it, while the attack of Fred upon the reptile, in the effort to save his companion, diverted the attention of the rattlesnake for an instant.
Jack saw the flat, pitted head, the gleaming coil, the distended jaws, while the slightly elevated tail vibrated so rapidly with the warning which, once heard, can never be forgotten, that it looked hazy and mist-like.

Before Fred, at imminent risk to himself, could bring down his clubbed gun with crushing force, Jack felt a sharp sting in his ankle and called out, in the extremity of terror: _"I'm bitten!"_ He was not only terrified but angered, and whirling about, he brought down his gun with spiteful violence on the writhing body.