came to his hut to look for food. All the other men were gone, but his
servant lay dead before the door; and the white man knew how it must have
happened. He could not creep further, and he lay down before the door, and
that night the white man and the black lay there dead together, side by
side. Both those men were of my friends."

"It was damned plucky of the nigger," said Peter; "but I've heard of their
doing that sort of thing before. Even of a girl who wouldn't tell where
her mistress was, and getting killed. But," he added doubtfully, "all your
company seem to be niggers or to get killed?"

"They are of all races," said the stranger. "In a city in the old Colony
is one of us, small of stature and small of voice. It came to pass on a
certain Sunday morning, when the men and women were gathered before him,
that he mounted his pulpit: and he said when the time for the sermon came,
'In place that I should speak to you, I will read you a history.' And he
opened an old book more than two thousand years old: and he read: 'Now it
came to pass that Naboth the Jezreelite had a vineyard, which was in
Jezreel, hard by the palace of Ahab king of Samaria.

"'And Ahab spake unto Naboth, saying, Give me thy vineyard, that I may have
it for a garden of herbs, because it is near unto my house: and I will
give thee for it a better vineyard than it; or, if it seemeth good to thee,
I will give thee the worth of it in money.

"'And Naboth said to Ahab, The Lord forbid it me, that I should give the
inheritance of my father unto thee.

"'And Ahab came into his house heavy and displeased because of the word
which Naboth the Jezreelite had spoken unto him; for he had said, I will