ling. After some deliberation a number of men walked off, one of
them a venerable old man, armed after the old fashion with a bow and
a handful of poisoned arrows, which he handled with deliberate care;
he also carried a club in a sling over his shoulder. Of all those
strong men, this old one seemed to me the most dangerous but also
the most beautiful and the most genuine. After a while they returned,
and two other men slunk in and stood apart.

The natives seemed undecided what to do, and squatted about, talking
among themselves, until at last one of them pulled me by the sleeve
and led us towards the two newcomers. We understood that they were
the murderers, and each of us took hold of one of them. They made no
resistance, but general excitement arose in the crowd, all the other
natives shouting and gesticulating, even threatening each other with
their rifles. They were split in two parties,--one that wanted to give
up the murderers, and their relatives, who wanted to keep them. We told
them that the affair would be settled if they gave up the murderers;
if not, the man-of-war would come and punish the whole village. As my
prisoner tried to get loose, I bound him, and while I was busy with
this I heard a shot. Seeing that all the men had their rifles ready,
I expected the fight to begin, but George told me his prisoner had
escaped and he had shot after him. The man had profited by George's
indecision to run away.

This actual outbreak of the hostilities excited the people so that
we thought it best to retire, taking our single prisoner with us. A
few of the natives followed us, and when we left the village the
relatives of the murderer broke out in violent wailing and weeping,
thinking, as did the prisoner, Belni, himself, that we were going to
eat him up, after having tortured him to death. Belni trembled all
over, was very gentle and inclined to weep like a punished child, but
quite resigned and not even offering any resistance. He only asked
Macao anxiously what we were going to do with him. Macao, furious
at the death of his comrade, for whom he seemed to have felt real
affection, put him in mortal fear, and was quite determined to avenge
his murdered friend. We shut Belni up in the hold of the cutter and
told the natives that they would have to hand over Bourbaki's rifle
and cartridges, and pay us two tusked pigs by noon of the next day.

On this occasion we learned the reason for the murder: Belni's
brother h