Komba,

"Remember, O Kalubi, that my fate to-day will be yours also in a day to
come. The god wearies of his priests. This year, next year, or the year
after; he always wearies of his priests."

"Then, O Kalubi-that-was," answered Komba in a mocking voice as the
canoe was pushed off, "pray to the god for me, that it may be the year
after; pray it as your bones break in his embrace."

While we watched that craft depart there came into my mind the memory
of a picture in an old Latin book of my father's, which represented the
souls of the dead being paddled by a person named Charon across a river
called the Styx. The scene before us bore a great resemblance to that
picture. There was Charon's boat floating on the dreadful Styx. Yonder
glowed the lights of the world, here was the gloomy, unknown shore. And
we, we were the souls of the dead awaiting the last destruction at the
teeth and claws of some unknown monster, such as that which haunts the
recesses of the Egyptian hell. Oh! the parallel was painfully exact. And
yet, what do you think was the remark of that irrepressible young man
Stephen?

"Here we are at last, Allan, my boy," he said, "and after all without
any trouble on our own part. I call it downright providential. Oh! isn't
it jolly! Hip, hip, hooray!"

Yes, he danced about in that filthy mud, threw up his cap and cheered!

I withered, or rather tried to wither him with a look, muttering the
single word: "Lunatic."

Providential! Jolly! Well, it's fortunate that some people's madness
takes a cheerful turn. Then I asked the Kalubi where the god was.

"Everywhere," he replied, waving his trembling hand at the illimitable
forest. "Perhaps behind this tree, perhaps behind that, perhaps a long
way off. Before morning we shall know."

"What are you going to do?" I inquired savagely.

"Die," he answered.

"Look here, fool," I exclaimed, shaking him, "you can die if you like,
but we don't mean to. Take us to some place where we shall be safe from
this god."

"One is never safe from the god, lord, especially in his own House," and
he shook his silly head and went on, "How can we be safe when there is
nowhere to go and even the trees are too big to climb?"

I looked at them, it was true. They were huge and ran up for fifty
or sixty feet without a bough. Moreover, it was probable that the god
climbed better than we could. The Kalubi began to move inland in an
indeterminate fashion, and I asked him where he