pping curtains
an endless procession of trees passed before his half-closed eyes. The
unintelligible gabble of the light-hearted bearers of his litter was
all that reached his ears. And ever at his side was Joseph--cheerful,
indefatigable, resourceful. There was in his mind one of the
greatest happinesses of life--the sense of something satisfactorily
accomplished--the peacefulness that comes when the necessity for effort
is past and left behind--that lying down to rest which must surely be
something like Death in its kindest form.

The awe inspired by Victor Durnovo's name went before the little caravan
like a moral convoy and cleared their path. Thus guarded by the name of
a man whom he hated, Jack Meredith was enabled to pass through a savage
country literally cast upon a bed of sickness.

In due course the river was reached, and the gentle swing of the litter
was changed for the smoother motion of the canoe. And it was at this
period of the journey--in the forced restfulness of body entailed--that
Joseph's mind soared to higher things, and he determined to write a
letter to Sir John.

He was, he admitted even to himself, no great penman, and his epistolary
style tended, perhaps, more to the forcible than to the finished.

"Somethin'," he reflected, "that'll just curl his back hair for 'im;
that's what I'll write 'im."

Msala had been devastated, and it was within the roofless walls of
Durnovo's house that Joseph finally wrote out laboriously the projected
capillary invigorator.

"HONOURED SIR" (he wrote),--"Trusting you will excuse the liberty, I
take up my pen to advise you respectfully"--while writing this word
Joseph closed his left eye--"that my master is taken seriously worse.
Having been on the sick-list now for a matter of five weeks, he just
lies on his bed as weak as a new-born babe, as the sayin' is, and
doesn't take no notice of nothing. I have succeeded in bringing him
down to the coast, which we hope to reach to-morrow, and when we get
to Loango--a poor sort of place--I shall at once obtain the best advice
obtainable--that is to be had. Howsoever, I may have to send for it; but
money being no object to either master or me, respectfully I beg to say
that every care will be took. Master having kind friends at Loango, I
have no anxiety as to the future, but, honoured sir, it has been a
near touch in the past--just touch and go, so to speak. Not being in
a position to form a estimate of what is the m