savage battleaxes -- and sharp as a razor, measuring five and
three-quarter inches across the widest part. From the back of
the axe sprang a stout spike four inches long, for the last two
of which it was hollow, and shaped like a leather punch, with
an opening for anything forced into the hollow at the punch end
to be pushed out above -- in fact, in this respect it exactly
resembled a butcher's pole-axe. It was with this punch end,
as we afterwards discovered, that Umslopogaas usually struck
when fighting, driving a neat round hole in his adversary's skull,
and only using the broad cutting edge for a circular sweep, or
sometimes in a melee. I think he considered the punch a neater
and more sportsmanlike tool, and it was from his habit of pecking
at his enemy with it that he got his name of 'Woodpecker'. Certainly
in his hands it was a terribly efficient one.

Such was Umslopogaas' axe, Inkosi-kaas, the most remarkable and
fatal hand-to-hand weapon that I ever saw, and one which he cherished
as much as his own life. It scarcely ever left his hand except
when he was eating, and then he always sat with it under his
leg.

Just as I returned his axe to Umslopogaas, Miss Flossie came
up and took me off to see her collection of flowers, African
liliums, and blooming shrubs, some of which are very beautiful,
many of the varieties being quite unknown to me and also, I believe,
to botanical science. I asked her if she had ever seen or heard
of the 'Goya' lily, which Central African explorers have told
me they have occasionally met with and whose wonderful loveliness
has filled them with astonishment. This lily, which the natives
say blooms only once in ten years, flourishes in the most arid