Savage superstitions, savage terrors, savage thrill at the raw smell of blood were all worked upon with a high dexterity. King Kallee had made a fine art of these incitements; he had gained a throne by their practice, and had handed them on to chosen ministers, who practised the cult of ju-ju with a single eye to advancing the interests of their king. The black soldiers were wearily tired, and many of them carried wounds. They listened at first with a sullen torpor. They heard without interest that the white man's bullets were non-consecrate, and therefore the wounds they made would soon heal. They learned, with a little thrill of wonder, that the green tins which poured burning flame were not true ju-ju, since the King of Kallee's ju-ju men declared them unorthodox. And by degrees their dull nerves were worked up till at the proper moment sacrifice was made, and the screams and smells of the victim maddened them. Even the Haûsa officers, who were Moslem, and therefore contemptuous disbelievers in all pagan ceremony, were stirred up almost equally with their men, and when as a final exhortation they were bidden to return once more to the factory, and bring the red head and the white girl as presents for the King, they forgot their qualms and their burns, and led on with a new, fierce courage. But whether the African be savage bushman or cultivated Moslem gentleman, superstition is part of the very marrow in his backbone. These men had felt the bullets, they had felt the infernal burnings of the benzoline, but they were wound up now to a pitch above dreading either. Orders were given to concentrate in the edge of the bush, as near to the clearing as they could get without being sighted from the factory, and then when all was ready the monkey-skin drums would beat the charge. The first comers peered through the outer fringe of the cover, and saw the clearing desolate, and the factory buildings to all appearance tenantless. The dead that they had left in their hurried retreat still lay where they had dropped, and glared up glassy stares at the outrageous sun. But with eyes keen to pick up any hint at ju-ju charm, the gaze of all this vanguard fell on five little wooden mannikins set opposite the points where the several bush roads cut into the open.