dued. Indeed slaughter may, in a way, be said to be a part of
their religion, for it is the fetich every young warrior must provide
for the worship of the woman of his choice before he may hope to win
and have her. It is necessary that he should have killed royal
game--lion, rhinoceros, or elephant--but not enough. Singlehanded he
must kill a man and bring the maid a trophy of the slaughter before she
will even consider him, and Danakil maids of spirit often demand some
plurality of trophies. Thus the license for each Danakil mating is
written in the life blood of some neighboring tribesman; thus are the
few poltroons in Danakil-land condemned to stay celibate.

Only Menelek's word do they heed; his might they dread.

Through the Danakil country, between Errer Gotto and Oder, not long ago
travelled the caravan of William Northrup McMillan, conveying the
sections of several steel boats with which he purposed navigating and
exploring the Blue Nile from its source to Khartoom, a region that had
never been traversed by white men. In the party was M.
Dubois-Desaulle, a gay and reckless ex-officer of the French Foreign
Legion who had long served in Algiers against raiding Arab sheiks. He
harbored no fear of the unorganized wild tribesmen through whose
country they were travelling. McMillan knew them better, however; he
held his command under strict military discipline, marched in close
order with scouts out, forbade straying from the column, and
_zareba_-ed his night camps. For the march was a severe one and he had
neither the time nor sufficient force to search for or to succor
missing stragglers.

Urged with the rest never to go unarmed and to stay close with the
caravan, Dubois-Desaulle's only reply was a laughing, "_Jamais!
Jamais. Je ne porte pas des armes pour ces babouins! Je les ferai
s'enfuir avec des batons! N'inquietez pas de moi._"

Interested in botany and entomology, holding the natives in utter
contempt, repeatedly he strayed from the column for hours without even
so much as a pistol by way of arms, until finally McMillan told him
that if he again so strayed he would be placed under guard for the
balance of march. But the very next day, riding a mule with the
advance guard led by H. Morgan Brown, Dubois-Desaulle slipped
unobserved into the bush, probably in pursuit of some winged wonder
that had crossed his path.

Camp was made early in the afternoon on the banks of the Doha River,
and a stron