s bearing the magic "things" of the Incarnation of an
Incarnation, the King-God.

As they splashed across the river, like troops of bronze gazelle, women
and girls dashed eager to gather of fertility from the water enchanted by
the passage of the Bearer of the World.

So they came through the banana plantation and up the wide street which
the Son-of-the-Earthquake had planned. The chant quavered like a dragonfly
in the sun and the chorus of the warriors replied with the rhythm and the
profundity of gargantuan frogs. Then as Bakahenzie stepped upon the
incline of the hill, burst from the women the cricket song which is made
tremolo by the rapid beating of the fingers upon the lips, as from the
drums went out the message over the land that the Unmentionable One had
indeed returned to the Place of Kings, the City of the Snake.

Ten minutes later a half-stewed god, as exhausted as any emperor after a
state parade, was permitted to emerge from the litter and to recuperate
within the cool of the unfinished house that was to have been the bungalow
of the Kommandant. No one else save the Keeper of the Fires, Bakahenzie
and Marufa, were within the stockade which ringed the fort. Outside rose
the mutter and rumble of the warriors and the cries of the women. The
huddled lines of huts which had been barracks were already in process of
demolition at the hands of the slaves, and the square within the fort was
cleared of the slain askaris by the simple process of heaving the bodies
over the palisade. The idol remained within the litter until the
consecrating of the defiled ground should be performed by Bakahenzie and
the craft.

No Wongolo nor any wizard, not even Bakahenzie, would touch the enchanted
coughing monsters; but as the holy slaves were already doomed they were
set to pull and to push the Nordenfeldt from the embrasure beside the
entrance across the levee until it toppled over and rolled half-way down
the hill, where it was allowed to stay, surrounded from morning to night
by a crowd of women and children and idle warriors.

The thirst which afflicted Birnier rendered him oblivious of his godhood
and of the sacred office of Mungongo who was dutifully busy upon his knees
blowing up the sacred fires from the ember which he had carried; so that
at a summons to bring water he was both embarrassed and awed, for the
presence of the High Priest intensified his natural terror of breaking any
of the meshes of the tabu. At the se