to our standards--but does your daughter--a clever and most attractive
little girl, by the way--think so? She seemed to look on him with
affection--one learns to read children's eyes, you know. A very strange
man, I repeat. If we could see all his heart we should know lots of
things and understand more about these people than we do at present. Has
it ever struck you, Mr. Bull, how little we white people _do_ understand
of the black man's soul? Perhaps a child can see farther into it than
we can. What is the saying--'a little child shall lead them,' is it
not? Perhaps we do not make enough allowances. 'Faith, Hope and Charity,
these three, but the greatest of these is charity'--or love, which is
the same thing. However, of course you are quite right not to have been
frightened by his silly talk about the _Isitunzi_, it would never do to
show fear or hesitation. Still, I am glad that Mrs. Bull did not hear
it; you may have noticed that she had gone on ahead, and if I were you
I should not repeat it to her, since ladies are so nervous. Tabitha, my
dear, don't tell your mother anything of all this."

"No, Bishop," answered Tabitha, "I never tell her all the queer things
that Menzi says to me when I meet him, or at least not many of them."

"I wish I had asked him if he had a cure for your local fever," said the
Bishop with a laugh, "for against it, although I have taken so much that
my ears buzz, quinine cannot prevail."

"He has given me one in a gourd, Bishop," replied Tabitha
confidentially, "but I have never taken any, because you see I have had
no fever, and I haven't told mother, for if I did she would tell father"
(Thomas had stridden ahead, and was out of hearing), "and he might be
angry because he doesn't like Menzi, though I do. Will you have some,
Bishop? It is well corked up with clay, and Menzi said it would keep for
years."

"Well, my dear," answered the Bishop, "I don't quite know. There may be
all sorts of queer things in Mr. Menzi's medicine. Still, he told you to
drink it if necessary, and I am absolutely certain that he does not
wish to poison _you_. So perhaps I might have a try, for really I feel
uncommonly ill."

So later on, with much secrecy, the gourd was produced, and the Bishop
had "a try." By some strange coincidence he felt so much better after it
that he begged for the rest of the stuff to comfort him on his homeward
journey, which ultimately he accomplished in the best of health.