gave
it me. He bought it in a store at Utrecht when we were coming back from
Pongoland."

"Why do you lie to me?" I asked "You have been fighting a white man
and for more than sixpence. You knocked him into a sluit and the mud
splashed up over you."

"Yes, Baas, that is so. Your spirit speaks truly to you of the matter.
Yet it wanders a little from the path, since I fought the white man for
less than sixpence. I fought him for love, which is nothing at all."

"Then you are even a bigger fool than I took you for, Hans. What do you
want now?"

"I want to borrow a pound, Baas. The white man will take me before
the magistrate, and I shall be fined a pound, or fourteen days in the
_trunk_ (i.e. jail). It is true that the white man struck me first, but
the magistrate will not believe the word of a poor old Hottentot against
his, and I have no witness. He will say, 'Hans, you were drunk again.
Hans, you are a liar and deserve to be flogged, which you will be next
time. Pay a pound and ten shillings more, which is the price of good
white justice, or go to the _trunk_ for fourteen days and make baskets
there for the great Queen to use.' Baas, I have the price of the justice
which is ten shillings, but I want to borrow the pound for the fine."

"Hans, I think that just now you are better able to lend me a pound than
I am to lend one to you. My bag is empty, Hans."

"Is it so, Baas? Well, it does not matter. If necessary I can make
baskets for the great white Queen to put her food in, for fourteen days,
or mats on which she will wipe her feet. The _trunk_ is not such a bad
place, Baas. It gives time to think of the white man's justice and to
thank the Great One in the Sky, because the little sins one did not do
have been found out and punished, while the big sins one did do,
such as--well, never mind, Baas--have not been found out at all. Your
reverend father, the Predikant, always taught me to have a thankful
heart, Baas, and when I remember that I have only been in the _trunk_
for three months altogether who, if all were known, ought to have been
there for years, I remember his words, Baas."

"Why should you go to the _trunk_ at all, Hans, when you are rich and
can pay a fine, even if it were a hundred pounds?"

"A month or two ago it is true I was rich, Baas, but now I am poor. I
have nothing left except ten shillings."

"Hans," I said severely, "you have been gambling again; you have been
drinking again. You have s