the company provided me with a close fitting suit of mail,
which I wore from the time I started until I returned. It was very
fortunate for me that I was so provided, for on three distinct
occasions I was served up for state dinners and each time successfully
resisted the carving knife and as a result, was thereafter well
received, all the chiefs looking upon me as one who bore a charmed
existence."

Here the Baron paused long enough for the Twins to reflect upon and
realise the terrors which had beset him on his way to Lake Majolica,
and be it said that if they had thought him brave before they now
deemed him a very hero of heroes.

"When I set out," said the Baron, "I was accompanied by ten Zanzibaris
and a thousand tins of condensed dinners."

"A thousand what, Uncle Munch?" asked Jack, his mouth watering.

"Condensed dinners," said the Baron, "I had a lot of my favourite
dinners condensed and put up in tins. I didn't expect to be gone more
than a year and a thousand dinners condensed and tinned, together with
the food I expected to find on the way, elephant meat, rhinoceros
steaks, and tiger chops, I thought would suffice for the trip. I could
eat the condensed dinners and my followers could have the elephant's
meat, rhinoceros steaks, and tiger chops--not to mention the bananas
and other fruits which grow wild in the African jungle. It was not
long, however, before I made the discovery that the Zanzibaris, in
order to eat tigers, need to learn first how to keep tigers from
eating them. We went to bed late one night on the fourth day out from
Lollokolela, and when we waked up the next morning every mother's son
of us, save myself, had been eaten by tigers, and again it was nothing
but my coat of mail that saved me. There were eighteen tigers' teeth
sticking into the sleeve of the coat, as it was. You can imagine my
distress at having to continue the search for Lake Majolica alone. It
was then that I acquired the habit of talking to myself, which has
kept me young ever since, for I enjoy my own conversation hugely, and
find myself always a sympathetic listener. I walked on for days and
days, until finally, on Christmas Eve, I reached King Mtulu's palace.
Of course your idea of a palace is a magnificent five-story building
with beautiful carvings all over the front of it, marble stair-cases
and handsomely painted and gilded ceilings. King Mtulu's palace was
nothing of the sort, although for that region it was qui