r so wise nor
so powerful as I thought them to be," retorted the king.

"Perhaps so," quietly remarked the professor. "Nevertheless we are very
powerful--sufficiently so to destroy you and your whole army in a
moment, should we choose to do so. Would you like to witness a specimen
or two of our power?"

M'Bongwele glanced somewhat nervously about him for a second or two, and
then with an obvious effort answered:

"Yes."

"I see that some of your followers here are armed with bows," continued
the professor. "Are they good marksmen?"

"The best in the world," answered the king proudly.

The professor in his turn hesitated an instant; he was about to make a
dangerous experiment. Then he drew from his pocket a small crimson silk
rosette, and, placing it in M'Bongwele's hand, said:

"I will attach this to any part of my dress you choose to point out;
then order one of your archers to shoot an arrow at it, and observe the
result."

The king took the rosette in his hand, examined it carefully, and passed
it round among his suite for inspection. On receiving it back he
suddenly wheeled round in his chair, and, reaching over, laid his finger
on Lethbridge's breast exactly over the heart.

"Fasten it _there_," he said with a scornful smile, "and I will shoot at
it myself."

The professor was disconcerted. The danger of the experiment consisted
in the possibility that the archer, instead of aiming at the rosette,
would select an eye or some part of the head for a mark, in which case
the result would be fatal. He was quite willing to incur the risk
himself, trusting that the archer's vanity would impel him to aim at the
right spot; but he had never contemplated the turn which affairs had now
taken.

Lethbridge, however, with a languid smile and a shrug of the shoulders,
rose to his feet, and, nonchalantly flicking the ash off the end of his
cigar, waited for the professor to affix the rosette.

A happy inspiration just then occurred to von Schalckenberg. "It is a
very small mark," he murmured confidentially to M'Bongwele; "I do not
believe you can hit it. Shall I get something larger?"

The king would not listen to any such proposal; he was evidently anxious
to exhibit his skill; and the professor, reassured, attached the rosette
to Lethbridge's coat in the exact spot indicated, M'Bongwele and his
companions watching the operation with the keenest interest.

The colonel, glancing round for a good backgrou