Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 3, 1892.djvu/348

340 administration had been popular, and did their best to comfort him, assuring him of their continued goodwill; but he only replied: "Bring me an assegai." In this way they brought him a large number of assegais, but no one could tell what he was going to do with them. They were piled up in his house, and no one used any of them. At last he called together all the young men who had been his companions in youth, and gave each a number of assegais. They next prepared food for many days, and all left and travelled a long distance till they found a strange people who were very rich. The chief of that people received the strangers and treated them hospitably, showing them all his wealth, and giving them everything they needed for their journey. They stayed with him to rest, "for", said they, "the way we travel is long, and we must eat and rest." One morning they rose very early, "while the stars were still bright", killed the men who guarded the chief's great place, and "carried away all his daughters and as many cattle as they could find in that country." They returned with a drove of cattle "like the grass", i.e., that could not be counted, and each had a beautiful princess whom he made his wife.

Their next step was to build a large village near the stream where the chief had his hunting ground, and which he "lent" to them because he was old and could no longer "throw a spear at a tiger". When the old man died there were two chiefs, but the young heir said, "There is only one chief in my father's country," and told his brother he must give back what had been lent to him by his father and go his way. When this was refused, the heir raised an army and made war upon his brother, who fled, after all his cattle were captured, and lived in a cave of a distant mountain with his companions. A crocodile came to the cave and spoke to the fugitive, saying, "Hail, chief!"

He replied, "I am no chief, I am an empty-handed wanderer. I came here to die with my friends."