property. Accordingly, no sooner is a piece separated and brought
out than it is pounced on by others who try to take it away; usually
a division takes place, subject to further sub-division, however, if
other claimants are at hand. The competition is not only tremendous,
but dangerous, for in their excitement the contestants frequently
wound one another. The Government (_i.e._, Mr. Worcester), while
at first necessarily allowing this sort of butchering, has steadily
discouraged and gradually reduced it, so that at Kiangan, for example,
the people were told that this was the last time they would ever
be allowed to kill beef in this fashion. It was pointed out to them
that the purpose being to furnish meat, their method of killing was
so uneconomical that the beef was really ruined, and nobody got what
he was really entitled to.

On this occasion, the carabao was tied to a stake in a small swale
and I nerved myself to look on. I saw the first cuts, the poor beast
look up from his grass in astonishment, totter, reel, and fall as blows
rained on him from all sides. The crowd, closing in, mercifully hid the
rest from view; the victim dying game without a sound. In this respect,
as well as in many others, the carabao is a very different animal
from the pig. But, while looking on at the mound of cutting, hacking,
sweating, and struggling butchers, the smell of fresh blood over all,
something occurred that completely shifted the center of interest. A
boy came up to us in great excitement to say that the prisoner had got
hold of a bayonet and was running _amok_. This was the prisoner of the
morning who had been so badly beaten; to make him more comfortable,
he had been laid on the veranda of the _cuartel_ (just behind us),
hobbled, but otherwise free. The boy spoke the truth; the prisoner had
snatched his bayonet from a passing Constabulary private, and, turning
into the _cuartel_, made for the provincial treasurer, who was busy