great earnestness, "if I can secure a condition of peace,
prosperity, sobriety, and if I can establish the Portuguese law in this
disturbed area."

"Undoubtedly," acknowledged the older man with profound seriousness.

So far from the duc's statement representing anything near the truth, it
may be said that a restoration of order would serve his Excellency very
badly indeed. In point of fact he received something like eight
shillings for every "head" of "recruited labour." He also received a
commission from the same interested syndicates which exported
able-bodied labourers, a commission amounting to six shillings upon
every case of square-face, and a larger sum upon every keg of rum that
came into the country.

Sobriety and law would, in fact, spell much discomfort to the elegant
lady who lived in the villa at Cintra, and would considerably diminish
not only Senhor Bonaventura's handsome balance at the Bank of Brazil,
but would impoverish certain ministers, permanent and temporary, who
looked to their dear Pinto for periodical contributions to what was
humorously described as "The Party Fund."

Yet the duc de Sagosta went into the wilds with a high heart and a
complete faith, in his youthful and credulous soul, that he had behind
him the full moral and physical support of a high-minded and patriotic
Governor. The high-minded and patriotic Governor, watching the caravan
of his new assistant disappearing through the woods which fringe Moanda,
expressed in picturesque language his fervent hope that the mud, the
swamp, the forest and the wilderness of the M'fusi country would swallow
up this young man for evermore, amen. The unpopularity of the new
Commissioner was sealed when the Governor learnt of his visit to
Sanders, for "Sanders" was a name at which his Excellency made
disapproving noises.

The predecessor of the duc de Sagosta was dead. His grave was in
the duc's front garden, and was covered with rank grass. The new-comer
found the office correspondence in order (as a glib native clerk
demonstrated); he also found 103 empty bottles behind the house, and
understood the meaning of that coarse grave in the garden. He found
that the last index number in the letter-book was 951.

It is remarkable that the man he succeeded should have found, in one
year, 951 subjects for correspondence, but it is the fact. Possibly nine
hundred of the letters had to do with the terrible state of the
Residency at Uango-Bozeri. The ro