Page:The further side of silence (IA furthersideofsil00clifiala).pdf/207

 tions. His suggestion was that the blood-money to be exacted from his tribe should take the form of seven human beings, who were to be duly delivered to the relatives of the dead man as slaves. These seven unfortunates were not to be members of his own or Ku-ish's tribe, but were to be captured by them from among the really wild people of the hills, who had had no share in the ill-doing, which it was my object to punish. The Porcupine and his brethren, he explained, would run some risk, and would be put to a considerable amount of trouble and exertion before the seven wild Sâkai could be caught, and this was to be the measure of their punishment. The blameless savages of the moun- tains I was, moreover, assured, were not deserving of any pity, as they had obviously been created in order to provide the wherewithal to meet such emier- gencies, and to supply their more civilized neighbours with a valuable commodity for barter. The old chief went on to tell me that his tribe would be merci- fully free from all fear of reprisals as owing to some incomprehensible but providential superstition, the wild Sakai never pursued a raiding party beyond a spot where the latter had left a spear sticking up- right in the ground. This, he said, was well known to the marauders, who took care to avail themselves of the protection thus afforded to them as soon as ever their captives had been secured. The assembled Sakai were unable to account for the paralysis with which the sight of this abandoned spear invariably smote the wild folk, but the extraordinary conven