We found Hans, who had not accompanied us, being a little shy of appearing in public just then, engaged in cleaning the rifles, and this reminded me of something.  Taking the double-barrelled gun of which I have spoken, I called Mavovo and handed it to him, saying: 

“It is yours, O true prophet.”

“Yes, my father,” he answered, “it is mine for a little while, then perhaps it will be yours again.”

The words struck me, but I did not care to ask their meaning.  Somehow I wanted to hear no more of Mavovo’s prophecies.

Then we dined, and for the rest of that afternoon slept, for all of us, including Brother John, needed rest badly.  In the evening Babemba came, and we three white men saw him alone.

“Tell us about the Pongo and this white devil they worship,” I said.

“Macumazana,” he answered, “fifty years have gone by since I was in that land and I see things that happened to me there as through a mist.  I went to fish amongst the reeds when I was a boy of twelve, and tall men robed in white came in a canoe and seized me.  They led me to a town where there were many other such men, and treated me very well, giving me sweet things to eat till I grew fat and my skin shone.  Then in the evening I was taken away, and we marched all night to the mouth of a great cave.  In this cave sat a horrible old man about whom danced robed people, performing the rites of the White Devil.

“The old man told me that on the following morning I was to be cooked and eaten, for which reason I had been made so fat.  There was a canoe at the mouth of the cave, beyond which lay water.  While all were asleep I crept to the canoe.  As I loosed the rope one of the priests woke up and ran at me.  But I hit him on the head with the paddle, for though only a boy I was bold and strong, and he fell into the water.  He came up again and gripped the edge of the canoe, but I struck his fingers with the paddle till he let go.  A great wind was blowing that night, tearing off boughs from the trees which grew upon the other shore of the water.  It whirled the canoe round and round and one of the boughs struck me in the eye.  I scarcely felt it at the time, but afterwards the eye withered.  Or perhaps it was a spear or a knife that struck me in the eye, I do not know.  I paddled till I lost my senses and always that wind blew.  The last thing that I remember was the sound of the canoe being driven by the gale through reeds.  When I woke up again I found myself near a shore, to which I waded through the mud, scaring great crocodiles.  But this must have been some days later, for now I was quite thin.  I fell down upon the shore, and there some of our people found me and nursed me till I recovered.  That is all.”

“And quite enough too,” I said.  “Now answer me.  How far was the town from the place where you were captured in Mazitu-land?”

“A whole day’s journey in the canoe, Macumazana.  I was captured in the morning early and we reached the harbour in the evening at a place where many canoes were tied up, perhaps fifty of them, some of which would hold forty men.”