re of Zomara and made a
mystic sign.

Instantly the ponderous jaws with their double row of iron teeth, each as
long and as sharp as swords, slowly opened, and there issued forth a
great roaring mass of flame that licked the upper jaw, a veritable tongue
of fire.

The Naya rose, swaying her long arms wildly, but the people remained
still kneeling, silent in awe.

Her voice was heard for a moment above the roaring and crackling of the
furnace in the throat of the colossus, and then, at a sudden signal from
the high priest, our three wretched black companions were seized by the
group of dwarfs, carried up a short flight of steps by white-robed
attendants, and hurled headlong into the flaming mouth of the monster.

A loud scream broke upon our ears, and for a single instant the flames
belched forth with increased fury, but as the last victim of this
horrible rite was consigned to his terrible doom, as sacrifice to the
dreaded god, the cruel jaws closed again with a heavy clang.

The merciless barbarity of the Great White Queen horrified us. The
fearful fate of those who had shared our perils during our adventurous
journey to this spectral land of mystery held us dumb in terror and
dismay.

Yet, ere the giant jaws of the hideous monstrosity had snapped together,
the people, hilarious and excited, sprang to their feet exhorting their
great deity to send his fiercest vengeance upon us, the intruders, that
our sinews might be withered and that we might rot by the road-side like
cattle smitten by the pest.

Then the terrible Naya, wheeling round slowly, gave her people her
blessing, and they, in turn, shouted themselves hoarse in frantic
adulation.

Truly, the scene was the strangest and most weird that my eyes had ever
gazed upon.

CHAPTER XXIV.

THE FLAMING MOUTH.

WE stood rooted to the spot. The hideous colossus, the intensely white
light streaming from its gigantic eyes, seemed to tower above us to an
enormous height, its outstretched wings threatening to enclose the great
swaying crowd of fanatical worshippers. With monotonous regularity the
long jaws, worked by hidden levers, fell apart, disclosing the terrible
pointed teeth against a roaring background of smoke and flame, and so
frenzied had the people now become, that each time the mouth of the
monster idol opened, numbers of wild-haired men and women rushed up the
incline that led to the blazing furnace, and with loud cries of adoration
of thei