opriate reward, for a brief though slight glance, and a gracious
inclination of the Arab's head, convinced our hero that the whole party
owed their lives to this man's gratitude.

They were not however exempt from indignity, for at the moment when Jack
Molloy fell they were overwhelmed by numbers, their arms were wrenched
from their grasp, and their hands were bound behind their backs. Thus
they were led, the reverse of gently, into the thick bush by a strong
party of natives, while the others, headed by the black-bearded chief,
continued their attack on the zereba.

It soon became evident that the men who had charge of the prisoners did
not share, or sympathise with, the feelings of the chief who had spared
their lives, for they not only forced them to hurry forward as fast as
they could go, but gave them occasional pricks with their spear-points
when any of them chanced to trip or stumble. One of the warriors in
particular--a fiery man--sometimes struck them with the shaft of his
spear and otherwise maltreated them. It may be easily understood that
men with unbroken spirits and high courage did not submit to this
treatment with a good grace!

Miles was the first to be tested in this way. On reaching a piece of
broken ground his foot caught in something and he stumbled forward. His
hands being bound behind him he could not protect his head, and the
result was that he plunged into a prickly shrub, out of which he arose
with flushed and bleeding countenance. This was bad enough, but when
the fiery Arab brought a lance down heavily on his shoulders his temper
gave way, and he rushed at the man in a towering rage, striving at the
same time, with intense violence, to burst his bonds. Of course he
failed, and was rewarded by a blow on the head, which for a moment or
two stunned him.

Seeing this, Armstrong's power of restraint gave way, and he sprang to
the rescue of his friend, but only to meet the same fate at the hands of
the fiery Arab.

Stunned and bleeding, though not subdued, they were compelled to move on
again at the head of the party--spurred on now and then by a touch from
the point of the fiery man's lance. Indeed it seemed as if this man's
passionate nature would induce him ere long to risk his chief's wrath by
disobeying orders and stabbing the prisoners!

Stevenson, the marine, was the next to suffer, for his foot slipped on a
stone, and he fell with such violence as to be unable to rise for a fe