Through a 'leaking' of time, the West African jungle starts to crystallize.Trees are metamorphosed into enormous jewels. Crocodiles encased in secondglittering skins lurch down the river. Pythons with huge blind gemstoneeyes rear in heraldic poses. Most men flee the area in terror, afraid toface what they cannot understand. But some, dazzled and strangelyentranced, remain to drift through this dreamworld forest. There is adoctor in pursuit of his ex-mistress, an enigmatic Jesuit wields a crystalcross, and a tribe of lepers search for Paradise. . .