“It may be professional prejudice, but I rather hope that local practitioner gets his gruel somehow before we clear out.”  Clay shivered.  “He’s a cruel devil.  Remember the remains of those two poor sacrificed wretches we found when we got here?”

Kettle shrugged his shoulders.  “I know.  But what could one do?  Niggers always are like that when they’re left to play about alone—­as these here have been, I suppose, since Creation Day.  We couldn’t pin the sacrifices on to the witch-doctor, or else, of course, we’d have strung him up.  We could only just give him an order for these customs to stop one-time, and stand by to see it carried out.  But we start the thing from now, on fresh, sensible lines.  We’re going to have no foolery about the nigger being as good as a white man.  He isn’t, and no man that ever saw him where he grows ever thought so.”

“Speaking scientifically,” said Clay, “it has always struck me that a nigger is an animal placed by the scheme of creation somewhere between a monkey and a white man.  You might bracket him, say, with a Portugee.”

“About that,” said Kettle; “and if you treat him as more, you make him into a bad failure, whereas if he’s left alone, he’s a bit nasty and cruel.  Now I think, Doc, there’s a middle course, and that’s what I’m going to try here whilst we’re making our pile.  We’ve grabbed four tidy villages already, and that makes a good beginning for this new republic; and when we’ve got things organized a bit more, and have a trifle of time, we can grab some others.  And, by James!  Doc, there’s a name for you—­the New Republic!”

“I seem to think it’s been used in a book somewhere.”

“The New Republic!” Kettle repeated relishingly.  “It goes well.  It’s certain to have been used before, but it’s good enough to be used again.  Some day, perhaps, it’ll have railways, and public-houses, and a postal service, and some day it may even issue stamps of its own.”

“With your mug in the middle!”

Captain Kettle reddened.  “I don’t see why not,” he said stiffly.  “I started the show, and by James! whilst I’m running it, the New Republic’s got to hum; and when I’m gone, I shall be remembered as some one out of the common.  I’m a man, Doctor Clay, that’s got a high sense of duty.  I should think it wrong to stay here sweating ivory out of these people, if I didn’t put something into them in return.”

“Well, you do seem to have got a hold over them, and that’s a fact, and I guess you will be able to make them—­” he broke off, and burst into a cackle of laughter.  “Oh, my Christian aunt, look there!”

A mob of natives were reverently approaching the hut, two of them carrying skinny chickens.  The witch-doctor led the advance.  Kettle guessed what was intended, and got up from his seat to interfere.

“Oh, look here, Skipper,” Clay pleaded, “don’t spoil the show.  Let’s do the traveller for once, and observe the ‘interesting native customs.’  You needn’t be afraid; they’re going to sacrifice the bigger hen to you, right enough.”