ho got in front of the bull and twisted its nose, not
he who sat on its back and poked at it with a spear."

At this period in our conversation I became suddenly faint and lost
count of things, even of the interesting Mameena. When I awoke again she
was gone, and in her place was old Umbezi, who, I noticed, took down
a mat from the side of the hut and folded it up to serve as a cushion
before he sat himself upon the stool.

"Greeting, Macumazahn," he said when he saw that I was awake; "how are
you?"

"As well as can be hoped," I answered; "and how are you, Umbezi?"

"Oh, bad, Macumazahn; even now I can scarcely sit down, for that bull
had a very hard nose; also I am swollen up in front where Sikauli struck
me when he tumbled out of the tree. Also my heart is cut in two because
of our losses."

"What losses, Umbezi?"

"Wow! Macumazahn, the fire that those low fellows of mine lit got to our
camp and burned up nearly everything--the meat, the skins, and even the
ivory, which it cracked so that it is useless. That was an unlucky hunt,
for although it began so well, we have come out of it quite naked; yes,
with nothing at all except the head of the bull with the cleft horn,
that I thought you might like to keep."

"Well, Umbezi, let us be thankful that we have come out with our
lives--that is, if I am going to live," I added.

"Oh, Macumazahn, you will live without doubt, and be none the worse. Two
of our doctors--very clever men--have looked at you and said so. One of
them tied you up in all those skins, and I promised him a heifer for the
business, if he cured you, and gave him a goat on account. But you must
lie here for a month or more, so he says. Meanwhile Panda has sent for
the hides which he demanded of me to be made into shields, and I have
been obliged to kill twenty-five of my beasts to provide them--that is,
of my own and of those of my headmen."

"Then I wish you and your headmen had killed them before we met those
buffalo, Umbezi," I groaned, for my ribs were paining me very much.
"Send Saduko and Sikauli here; I would thank them for saving my life."

So they came, next morning, I think, and I thanked them warmly enough.

"There, there, Baas," said Scowl, who was literally weeping tears of joy
at my return from delirium and coma to the light of life and reason; not
tears of Mameena's sort, but real ones, for I saw them running down his
snub nose, that still bore marks of the eagle's claws. "There, t