One said this thing, one that, but all agreed that they must wait to
act until the snow melted.

"Or till we freeze, you whose mothers were fools!" said the White Man,
who was in the worst of tempers, for had he not lost four hundred
pounds' worth of oxen?

Then a Zulu spoke, who hitherto had remained silent. He was the driver
of the first wagon.

"My father," he said to the White Man, "this is my word. The oxen are
lost in the snow. No man knows whither they have gone, or whether they
live or are now but hides and bones. Yet at the kraal yonder," and he
pointed to some huts about two miles away on the hillside, "lives a
witch doctor named Zweete. He is old--very old--but he has wisdom, and
he can tell you where the oxen are if any man may, my father."

"Stuff!" answered the White Man. "Still, as the kraal cannot be colder
than this wagon, we will go and ask Zweete. Bring a bottle of
squareface and some snuff with you for presents."

An hour later he stood in the hut of Zweete. Before him was a very
ancient man, a mere bag of bones, with sightless eyes, and one hand--
his left--white and shrivelled.

"What do you seek of Zweete, my white father?" asked the old man in a
thin voice. "You do not believe in me and my wisdom; why should I help
you? Yet I will do it, though it is against your law, and you do wrong
to ask me,--yes, to show you that there is truth in us Zulu doctors, I
will help you. My father, I know what you seek. You seek to know where