eless, then Jerry's growl was soft.

It never entered Jerry's mind to question why he was taught all this. He
merely did it because it was this latest master's desire that he should.
All this, and much more, at a cost of interminable time and patience,
Nalasu taught him, and much more he taught him, increasing his vocabulary
so that, at a distance, they could hold quick and sharply definite
conversations.

Thus, at fifty feet away, Jerry would "Whuff!" softly the information
that there was a noise he did not know; and Nalasu, with different
sibilances, would hiss to him to stand still, to whuff more softly, or to
keep silent, or to come to him noiselessly, or to go into the bush and
investigate the source of the strange noise, or, barking loudly, to rush
and attack it.

Perhaps, if from the opposite direction Nalasu's sharp ears alone caught
a strange sound, he would ask Jerry if he had heard it. And Jerry, alert
to his toes to listen, by an alteration in the quantity or quality of his
whuff, would tell Nalasu that he did not hear; next, that he did hear;
and, perhaps finally, that it was a strange dog, or a wood-rat, or a man,
or a boy--all in the softest of sounds that were scarcely more than
breath-exhalations, all monosyllables, a veritable shorthand of speech.

Nalasu was a strange old man. He lived by himself in a small grass house
on the edge of the village. The nearest house was quite a distance away,
while his own stood in a clearing in the thick jungle which approached no
where nearer than sixty feet. Also, this cleared space he kept
continually free from the fast-growing vegetation. Apparently he had no
friends. At least no visitors ever came to his dwelling. Years had
passed since he discouraged the last. Further, he had no kindred. His
wife was long since dead, and his three sons, not yet married, in a foray
behind the bounds of Somo had lost their heads in the jungle runways of
the higher hills and been devoured by their bushman slayers.

For a blind man he was very busy. He asked favour of no one and was self-
supporting. In his house-clearing he grew yams, sweet potatoes, and
taro. In another clearing--because it was his policy to have no trees
close to his house--he had plantains, bananas, and half a dozen coconut
palms. Fruits and vegetables he exchanged down in the village for meat
and fish and tobacco.

He spent a good portion of his time on Jerry's education, and, on
occasion, wo