ttered fragments of the ways
of human beings.

When he had followed Kulonga through the forest he had expected to come
to a city of strange houses on wheels, puffing clouds of black smoke
from a huge tree stuck in the roof of one of them--or to a sea covered
with mighty floating buildings which he had learned were called,
variously, ships and boats and steamers and craft.

He had been sorely disappointed with the poor little village of the
blacks, hidden away in his own jungle, and with not a single house as
large as his own cabin upon the distant beach.

He saw that these people were more wicked than his own apes, and as
savage and cruel as Sabor, herself. Tarzan began to hold his own kind
in low esteem.

Now they had tied their poor victim to a great post near the center of
the village, directly before Mbonga's hut, and here they formed a
dancing, yelling circle of warriors about him, alive with flashing
knives and menacing spears.

In a larger circle squatted the women, yelling and beating upon drums.
It reminded Tarzan of the Dum-Dum, and so he knew what to expect. He
wondered if they would spring upon their meat while it was still alive.
The Apes did not do such things as that.

The circle of warriors about the cringing captive drew closer and
closer to their prey as they danced in wild and savage abandon to the
maddening music of the drums. Presently a spear reached out and
pricked the victim. It was the signal for fifty others.

Eyes, ears, arms and legs were pierced; every inch of the poor writhing
body that did not cover a vital organ became the target of the cruel
lancers.

The women and children shrieked their delight.

The warriors licked their hideous lips in anticipation of the feast to
come, and vied with one another in the savagery and loathsomeness of
the cruel indignities with which they tortured the still conscious
prisoner.

Then it was that Tarzan of the Apes saw his chance. All eyes were
fixed upon the thrilling spectacle at the stake. The light of day had
given place to the darkness of a moonless night, and only the fires in
the immediate vicinity of the orgy had been kept alight to cast a
restless glow upon the restless scene.

Gently the lithe boy dropped to the soft earth at the end of the
village street. Quickly he gathered up the arrows--all of them this
time, for he had brought a number of long fibers to bind them into a
bundle.

Without haste he wrapped them securely