d at the sound
of it all the Beast People writhed and grovelled in the dust.
Then, slinking out of the canebrake, stooping near the ground
and trying to join the dust-throwing circle behind Moreau's back,
came the Leopard-man. The last of the Beast People to arrive was the little
Ape-man. The earlier animals, hot and weary with their grovelling,
shot vicious glances at him.

"Cease!" said Moreau, in his firm, loud voice; and the Beast People
sat back upon their hams and rested from their worshipping.

"Where is the Sayer of the Law?" said Moreau, and the hairy-grey
monster bowed his face in the dust.

"Say the words!" said Moreau.

Forthwith all in the kneeling assembly, swaying from side to side
and dashing up the sulphur with their hands,--first the right hand
and a puff of dust, and then the left,--began once more to chant
their strange litany. When they reached, "Not to eat Flesh or Fish,
that is the Law," Moreau held up his lank white hand.

"Stop!" he cried, and there fell absolute silence upon them all.

I think they all knew and dreaded what was coming.
I looked round at their strange faces. When I saw their wincing
attitudes and the furtive dread in their bright eyes, I wondered
that I had ever believed them to be men.

"That Law has been broken!" said Moreau.

"None escape," from the faceless creature with the silvery hair.
"None escape," repeated the kneeling circle of Beast People.

"Who is he?" cried Moreau, and looked round at their faces,
cracking his whip. I fancied the Hyena-swine looked dejected,
so too did the Leopard-man. Moreau stopped, facing this creature,
who cringed towards him with the memory and dread of infinite torment.

"Who is he?" repeated Moreau, in a voice of thunder.

"Evil is he who breaks the Law," chanted the Sayer of the Law.

Moreau looked into the eyes of the Leopard-man, and seemed to be
dragging the very soul out of the creature.

"Who breaks the Law--" said Moreau, taking his eyes off his victim,
and turning towards us (it seemed to me there was a touch of exultation
in his voice).

"Goes back to the House of Pain," they all clamoured,--"goes back
to the House of Pain, O Master!"

"Back to the House of Pain,--back to the House of Pain,"
gabbled the Ape-man, as though the idea was sweet to him.

"Do you hear?" said Moreau, turning back to the criminal,
"my friend--Hullo!"

For the Leopard-man, released from Moreau's eye, had risen straight
from his kne