n behind where
the remnants of his army were trying to re-form. There in front of them
the giant turned and stood at bay.

Umslopogaas halted also, waiting for us to come up, since, cunning old
warrior as he was, he feared lest should he begin the fight before that
happened, the horde of them would fall on him. Thirty seconds later
we arrived and found him standing still with bent body, small shield
advanced and the great axe raised as though in the act of striking, a
wondrous picture outlined as it was against the swiftly rising-sun.

Some ten paces away stood the giant leaning on the axe he bore, which
was not unlike to that with which woodmen fell big trees. He was an evil
man to see and at this, my first full sight of him, I likened him in
my mind to Goliath whom David overthrew. Huge he was and hairy, with
deep-set, piercing eyes and a great hooked nose. His face seemed thin
and ancient also, when with a motion of the great head, he tossed his
long locks back from about it, but his limbs were those of a Hercules
and his movements full of a youthful vigour. Moreover his aspect as a
whole was that of a devil rather than of a man; indeed the sight of it
sickened me.

"Let me shoot him," I cried to Umslopogaas, for I had reloaded the rifle
as I ran.

"Nay, Watcher-by-Night," answered the Zulu without moving his head,
"rifle has had its chance and failed. Now let us see what axe can do. If
I cannot kill this man, I will be borne hence feet first who shall have
made a long journey for nothing."

Then the giant began to talk in a low, rumbling voice that reverberated
from the slope of the little hill behind us.

"Who are you?" he asked, speaking in the same tongue that the Amahagger
use, "who dare to come face to face with Rezu? Black hound, do you not
know that I cannot be slain who have lived a year for every week of your
life's days, and set my foot upon the necks of men by thousands. Have
you not seen the spear shatter and the iron balls melt upon my breast
like rain-drops, and would you try to bring me down with that toy you
carry? My army is defeated--I know it. But what matters that when I can
get me more? Because the sacrifice was not completed and the white queen
was not wed, therefore my army was defeated by the magic of Lulala, the
White Witch who dwells in the tombs. But _I_ am not defeated who cannot
be slain until I show my back, and then only by a certain axe which long
ago has rusted into dust."