t it well
merits that name! We shall make it blaze, this water! Jose-Antonio
Alvez will offer a punch to the King Moini Loungga."

The drunkard shook his friend Alvez's hands. He could not contain his
joy. His wives, his courtiers shared his ecstasy. They had never seen
brandy blaze, and doubtless they counted on drinking it all blazing.
Then, after the thirst for alcohol, the thirst for blood, so imperious
among these savages, would be satisfied also.

Poor Dick Sand! What a horrible punishment awaited him. When we think
of the terrible or grotesque effects of intoxication in civilized
countries, we understand how far it can urge barbarous beings.

We will readily believe that the thought of torturing a white could
displease none of the natives, neither Jose-Antonio Alvez, a negro
like themselves, nor Coimbra, a mongrel of black blood, nor Negoro
either, animated with a ferocious hatred against the whites.

The evening had come, an evening without twilight, that was going to
make day change tonight almost at once, a propitious hour for the
blazing of the brandy.

It was truly a triumphant idea of Alvez's, to offer a punch to this
negro majesty, and to make him love brandy under a new form. Moini
Loungga began to find that fire-water did not sufficiently justify its
name. Perhaps, blazing and burning, it would tickle more agreeably the
blunted papillas of his tongue.

The evening's program then comprised a punch first, a punishment
afterwards.

Dick Sand, closely shut up in his dark prison, would only come out to
go to his death. The other slaves, sold or not, had been put back in
the barracks. There only remained at the "tchitoka," the traders, the
overseers and the soldiers ready to take their part of the punch, if
the king and his court allowed them.

Jose-Antonio Alvez, advised by Negoro, did the thing well. They
brought a vast copper basin, capable of containing at least two
hundred pints, which was placed in the middle of the great place.
Barrels holding alcohol of inferior quality, but well refined, were
emptied into the basin. They spared neither the cinnamon, nor the
allspice, nor any of the ingredients that might improve this punch for
savages.

All had made a circle around the king. Moini Loungga advanced
staggering to the basin. One would say that this vat of brandy
fascinated him, and that he was going to throw himself into it.

Alvez generously held him back and put a lighted match into his ha