"Answer my question and I will answer yours." Then, laying down the harp, Tua looked again into her basket and found that beneath a layer of dried papyrus leaves were hidden pearls, thousands of pearls of all sizes, and of such lustre and beauty as she had never seen.

They were strung upon threads of silk, all those of a like size being set upon a single thread, except the very biggest, which were as great as a finger nail, or even larger, that lay wrapped up separately in cloth at the bottom of the basket.
"Surely," said Tua, amazed, "no Queen in all the earth ever had a dower of such priceless pearls.

Moreover, what good they and the harp can be to us in this forest I may not guess." "Doubtless we shall discover in due course," answered Asti; "meanwhile, let us thank the gods for their gifts and eat." So they ate, and then, having nothing else to do, lay down by the fire and would have slept.
But scarcely had they closed their eyes when the forest seemed to awake.
First from down by the river there came dreadful roarings which they knew must be the voice of lions, for there were tame beasts of this sort in the gardens at Thebes.

Next they heard the whines and wimperings of wolves and jackals, and mingled with them great snortings such as are made by the rhinoceros and the river-horse.
Nearer, nearer came these awful sounds, till at length they saw yellow eyes moving like stars in the darkness at the edge of the forest, while cross the patch of sand beneath their rock galloped swift shapes which halted and sniffed towards them.

Also on the river side of them appeared huge, hog-like beasts, with gleaming tusks, and red cavernous mouths, and beyond these again, crashing through the brushwood, a gigantic brute that bore a single horn upon its snout.
"Now our end is at hand," said Tua faintly, "for surely these creatures will devour us." But Asti only threw more wood upon the fire and waited, thinking that the flame would frighten them away.