been handed down from preceptor to neophyte since that long-gone
day when the ancestors of the Piltdown man still swung by their
tails in the humid jungles that are England now.

And in the shelter of the hut, La paced to and fro beside the
stoic ape-man. Resigned to his fate was Tarzan. No hope of succor
gleamed through the dead black of the death sentence hanging over
him. He knew that his giant muscles could not part the many strands
that bound his wrists and ankles, for he had strained often, but
ineffectually for release. He had no hope of outside help and
only enemies surrounded him within the camp, and yet he smiled at
La as she paced nervously back and forth the length of the shelter.

And La? She fingered her knife and looked down upon her captive.
She glared and muttered but she did not strike. "Tonight!" she
thought. "Tonight, when it is dark I will torture him." She looked
upon his perfect, godlike figure and upon his handsome, smiling
face and then she steeled her heart again by thoughts of her love
spurned; by religious thoughts that damned the infidel who had
desecrated the holy of holies; who had taken from the blood-stained
altar of Opar the offering to the Flaming God--and not once but
thrice. Three times had Tarzan cheated the god of her fathers.
At the thought La paused and knelt at his side. In her hand was a
sharp knife. She placed its point against the ape-man's side and
pressed upon the hilt; but Tarzan only smiled and shrugged his
shoulders.

How beautiful he was! La bent low over him, looking into his
eyes. How perfect was his figure. She compared it with those of
the knurled and knotted men from whom she must choose a mate, and