nnel shirt of Baden-Powell, they
would find not only a happy issue to their jaundice, but even discover
that the world is a good place for a man to spend his days in--if he
but live like a man.

Hear Baden-Powell on this subject, and get a glimpse of his serious
side, which so seldom peeps out for the world to see: "Old Oliver
Wendell Holmes," he says, "is only too true when he says that most of
us are 'boys all our lives'; we have our toys, and will play with them
with as much zest at eighty as at eight, that in their company we can
never grow old. I can't help it if my toys take the form of all that
has to do with veldt life, and if they remain my toys till I drop.

"Then here's to our boyhood, its gold and its grey,
The stars of its winter, the dews of its May;
And when we have done with our life-lasting toys,
Dear Father, take care of Thy children, the boys.

"May it not be that our toys are the various media adapted to
individual tastes through which men may know their God? As
Ramakrishna Paramahansa writes: 'Many are the names of God, and
infinite the forms that lead us to know of Him. In whatsoever name or
form you desire to know Him, in that very name and form you will know
Him.'"

CHAPTER IX

ROAD-MAKER AND BUILDER

King Prempeh was the first celebrity to receive the attention of B.-P.
In his capital of Kumassi, which being interpreted is "the
death-place," this miserable barbarian had been practising the most
odious cruelties for many years, ignoring British remonstrances, and
failing, like another African potentate, to keep his word to
successive British Governments. Among the Ashantis at this time (1895)
the blood-lust had got complete dominion, and the sacrifice of human
life in the capital of their kingdom was so appalling that England was
at last obliged to buckle on her armour. To quote B.-P. in a
characteristic utterance: "To the Ashanti an execution was as
attractive an entertainment as is a bull-fight to a Spaniard, or a
football match to an Englishman." Even the most coddled schoolboy
will appreciate the force of this comparison.

To give a general idea of these cruelties we will quote a vivid
passage from Baden-Powell's book, _The Downfall of Prempeh_: "Any
great public function was seized on as an excuse for human sacrifices.
There was the annual yam custom, or harvest festival, at which large
numbers of victims were often offered to the gods. The late king went
e