"God knows."

"May He deliver you from such a deed. Come round to the house for some
food."

"But I've got married since you saw me, and expect an heir, yet they
chaff me and call me a boy because I have never yet killed a man."

I asked an old servant who had been to England, and seemed "almost
a Christian," to try and dissuade him, but only to meet with an
appreciative, "Well done! I always thought there was something in that
lad."

So I tried a second, but with worse results, for he patted the boy
on the back with an assurance that he could not dissuade him from so
sacred a duty; and at last I had to do what I could myself. I extorted
a promise that he would try and arrange to take blood-money, but as he
left the door his eye fell on a broken walking-stick.

"Oh, do give me that! It's no use to you, and it _would_ make such a
nice prop for my gun, as I am a very bad shot, and we mean to wait
outside for them in the dark."

The sequel I have never heard.

Up in those mountains every one lives in fortified dwellings--big men
in citadels, others in wall-girt villages, all from time to time
at war with one another, or with the dwellers in some neighbouring
valley. Fighting is their element; as soon as "the powder speaks"