ied, making the air vibrate
with their barbarous songs, the unhappy captives meanwhile, staggering
under their heavy loads, being compelled to keep pace with their
light-footed guard. It was not so bad for Dick and Earle as it was for
their unfortunate servants, for the two white men were by this time in
the very perfection of training, and capable of an amount of physical
exertion that, six months earlier, they would have regarded as
impossible; moreover, they were both highly endowed with that
inestimable quality known as "grit," while the miserable bearers were,
in addition to their heavy loads, weighed down by a premonition that
their present misery was but the prelude to an inconceivably horrible
and lingering death.

Late in the evening of the fifth day, after an exceptionally long and
fatiguing march, the company reached what was without doubt the capital
of the country, for it covered some two hundred acres of ground, and
contained dwellings capable of accommodating, at a moderate estimate, at
least five thousand persons. It is true the dwellings were of the most
primitive description, consisting of huts, for the most part built of
wattles and palm thatch, with here and there a more pretentious
structure, the walls of which were adobe, and it was indescribably
filthy; yet the place was laid out with some pretension to regularity,
being divided up into several wide streets, while in the centre of the
town there was a wide, open space, or square, one side of which was
occupied by a hideous and ungainly idol of gigantic proportions, with a
long sacrificial altar at its feet, while on the other three sides stood
dwellings of such pretentious character that they could only belong to
the chief dignitaries of the place.

The arrival of the captives in this town--the name of which, it
subsequently transpired, was Yacoahite--was the signal for an outburst
of most extravagant rejoicing on the part of the inhabitants, who turned
out _en masse_ to witness the event, crowding about the party so
persistently that it was only with the utmost difficulty that the
guards, reinforced by a strong body from the town, were able by a free
use of the butts of their spears, to force a passage along the streets.
The delight of the populace, it appeared, was almost wholly due to the
capture of the white men, who were the objects of their unquenchable
curiosity, to such an extent, indeed, that it looked very much as though
they had nev