there is another one ready for him there. By Jove! I should like to have
the setting of it.'

"And so he talked on, and I sat and listened to him, wondering how he
had kept his reason for so many years. But he didn't talk as I have told
it, in plain English. He spoke very slowly, and as though he had got
something in his mouth, continually using native words because the
English ones had slipped his memory.

"At last Nala came up and told us that food was made ready, and thankful
enough we were to get it, I can tell you. After we had eaten we held
a consultation. Quite a thousand of Wambe's soldiers were put _hors
de combat_, but at least two thousand remained hidden in the bush and
rocks, and these men, together with those in the outlying kraals, were a
source of possible danger. The question arose, therefore, what was to
be done--were they to be followed or left alone? I waited till everybody
had spoken, some giving one opinion and some another, and then being
appealed to I gave mine. It was to the effect that Nala should take a
leaf out of the great Zulu T'Chaka's book, and incorporate the tribe,
not destroy it. We had a good many women among the prisoners. Let them,
I suggested, be sent to the hiding-places of the soldiers and make
an offer. If the men would come and lay down their arms and declare
allegiance to Nala, they and their town and cattle should be spared.
Wambe's cattle alone would be seized as the prize of war. Moreover,
Wambe having left no children, his wife Maiwa should be declared
chieftainess of the tribe, under Nala. If they did not accept this offer
by the morning of the second day it should be taken as a declaration
that they wished to continue the war. Their town should be burned, their
cattle, which our men were already collecting and driving in in great
numbers, would be taken, and they should be hunted down.