if a grasshopper lit on one
end or the other, it would turn the scale."

"And do you wish me to be that grasshopper, Zikali?"

"Who else? That is why I brought you to Zululand."

"So you wish me to counsel Cetewayo to lie down in the bed that
the English have made for him. If he seeks my advice I will do
so gladly, for so I am sure he will sleep well."

"Why do you mock me, Macumazahn? I wish you to counsel Cetewayo
to throw back his word into the teeth of the Queen's man and to
fight the English."

"And thus bring destruction on the Zulus and death to thousands
of them and of my own people, and in return gain nothing but
remorse. Do you think me mad or wicked, or both, that I should
do this thing?"

"Nay, Macumazahn, you would gain much. I could show you where
the king's cattle are hidden. The English will never find them,
and after the war you might take as many as you chose. But it
would be useless, for knowing you well, I am sure that you would
only hand them over to the British Government, as once you handed
over the cattle of Bangu, being fashioned that way by the
Great-Great, Macumazahn."

"Perhaps I might, but then what should I gain, Zikali?"

"This: you would so bring things about that, being broken by war,
the Zulu power could never again menace the white men, which
would be a great and good deed, Macumazahn."

"Mayhap--I am not sure. But of this I am sure, that I will not
thrust my face into your nest of wasps, that the English hornets
may steal the honey when they are disturbed. I leave such
matters to the Queen and those who rule under her. So have done
with such talk, for you do but waste your breath, Zikali."

"It is as I guessed it would be," he answered, shaking his great
head. "You are too honest to prosper in the world, Macumazahn.
Well, I must find other means to bring the House of Cetewayo to
the end that he deserves, who has been an evil and a cruel king."

All this he said, showing neither surprise nor resentment, which
convinced me of what I had suspected throughout, that never for
an instant did he believe that I should fall in with his
suggestions and try to influence the Zulus to declare war. No,
this talk of his was but a blind; there was some deeper scheme at
work in his cunning old brain which he was hiding from me. Why
exactly had he beguiled me to Zululand? I could not divine, and
to ask him would be worse than useless, but then and there I made
up my mind