The infliction was not severe. It was merely
the indignity that was aimed at. The haughty Arab, however, might have
been made of wood for all the sign he gave of either pain or
humiliation. But the two white men were thoroughly disgusted, and it is
absolutely certain that, had the means been at hand, they would, at all
risks, have aided their late enemy to escape.

"Why degrade a brave man thus, leader of the Great Great One's impi?"
Haviland had expostulated. "If he is to die, even in torment, it may be
that he has deserved that. But to degrade him at the hands of these
vile dogs, who just now trembled at the mere sound of his name--is that
well?"

"Is it well?" echoed Dumaliso, with a brutal laugh. "See there, white
man," pointing with his great assegai at Mushad. "If yonder dog had
fifty lives, every one of them should be taken from him in the torment
of many days. For him nothing is too bad. It is the word of the Great
Great One."

"What has he done, that your King should hate him so?"

"_Au_! He has seized and made slaves of some of our people. Inswani
slaves! Think of it, _Umlungu_! That for one thing. For another, he
has sworn to seize the Great Great One, and turn him into the meanest of
slaves, to heap indignities upon him far worse than any we have heaped
upon his vile carrion carcase, indignities which are not to be named.
This hath he done, O insect-hunter! Is it not enough?"

Haviland realised the futility of further remonstrance, but the
unpleasant conviction seemed to be growing upon them more and more that
they had perchance only fallen out of the frying-pan into the fire--that
they were themselves virtually prisoners, and that in the hands of a
race of ferocious savages without one spark of humanity or ruth--in
short, for sheer devilish, bloodthirsty cruelty not one whit behind
those from whom they had been delivered. Not a day but furnished forth
instances of this. The captive slave-hunters had been forced to act as
carriers, and enormous bundles containing the loot of both camps had
been placed upon them to bear. Did they falter, they were unmercifully
beaten and goaded on with spear-points, while several, who from sheer
exhaustion gave up, were savagely tortured and mutilated and left to
die. To our two friends it was simply horrible. It was as though the
dark places of the earth were indeed given over to devils in human
shape--to work their utmost in deeds of sickening barb