gacona!" he said. "As I was, so is this boy. Go on, lad, in
that path, and thou mayst find those who shall cry the royal salute of
Bayete to thee at the end of it. Only keep out of my way, for two of a
kind might not agree. Now begone!"

So we went out, but as we passed them I saw the doctors muttering
together, for they were ill-pleased and foreboded evil. Also they were
jealous of me, and wished to smite me through the heart of him who was
called my son.

CHAPTER VIII. THE GREAT INGOMBOCO

After this there was quiet until the Feast of the First-fruits was
ended. But few people were killed at these feast, though there was
a great Ingomboco, or witch-hunt, and many were smelt out by the
witch-doctors as working magic against the king. Now things had come
to this pass in Zululand--that the whole people cowered before the
witch-doctors. No man might sleep safe, for none knew but that on the
morrow he would be touched by the wand of an Isanusi, as we name a
finder of witches, and led away to his death. For awhile Chaka said
nothing, and so long as the doctors smelt out those only whom he wished
to get rid of--and they were many--he was well pleased. But when they
began to work for their own ends, and to do those to death whom he did
not desire to kill, he grew angry. Yet the custom of the land was
that he whom the witch-doctor touched must die, he and all his house;
therefore the king was in a cleft stick, for he scarcely dared to save
even those whom he loved. One night I came to doctor him, for he was
sick in his mind. On that very day there had been an Ingomboco, and five
of the bravest captains of the army had been smelt out by the Abangoma,
the witch-finders, together with many others. All had been destroyed,
and men had been sent to kill the wives and children of the dead. Now
Chaka was very angry at this slaying, and opened his heart to me.

"The witch-doctors rule in Zululand, and not I, Mopo, son of Makedama,"
he said to me. "Where, then, is it to end? Shall I myself be smelt out
and slain? These Isanusis are too strong for me; they lie upon the land
like the shadow of night. Tell me, how may I be free of them?"

"Those who walk the Bridge of Spears, O king, fall off into Nowhere,"
I answered darkly; "even witch-doctors cannot keep a footing on that
bridge. Has not a witch-doctor a heart that can cease to beat? Has he
not blood that can be made to flow?"

Chaka looked at me strangely. "Thou art a bold ma