The importance of being on good terms with the ruler is as great in West Africa as elsewhere; hence we get the happy saw, "To love the king is not bad, but to be loved by the king is better." In the last that we shall quote, though the temptation to extend our list is great, we find ourselves quite in the opposite scale of savage society, in the touching proverb, "When a poor man makes a proverb it does not spread." This is Oji experience, but it is certainly not Oji alone. The man is poor and friendless, overridden and despised. The writer of _Ecclesiastes_ saw the matter as clearly, for he tells us that "There was a little city and few men within it, and there came a great king against it and besieged it, and built great bulwarks against it. Now, there was found in it a poor wise man, and he by his wisdom delivered the city, yet no man remembered that same poor man. Then said I, wisdom is better than strength; nevertheless the poor man's wisdom is despised, and his words are not heard." As it was in Palestine in the days of old, so it is in Oji-land to-day, and so in all lands will it ever be. The jokes of the judge will convulse the court and his wisdom enthral it, but no meaner authority therein, either as humorist or sage, will be heard, under pain of expulsion. Another valuable store of proverb-philosophy will be found in the pages of the Talmud. The teaching is excellent: "A myrtle among nettles is still a myrtle"; "He who prays for his neighbour will be heard for himself"; "Prepare thyself in the hall, that thou mayest be admitted into the palace"; so pass through these things temporal that a welcome may be thine in the presence of the King. If offence must come, "Be thou the cursed, not he who curses," and "Let the honour of thy neighbour be to thee as thine own." Scorn ingratitude and "Throw no stone into the well whence thou hast drunk," and bear ever in mind the difficult lesson, "Teach thy tongue to say I do not know." He who professes to know all things shuts himself out of much opportunity for gaining knowledge. "In two cabs of dates is one cab of stones," much that is profitless will ever be mixed with the good. How true too the caution, "He who is suspicious should be suspected." To the pure all things are pure, and the honest man thinks no evil, but the man of evil heart lives in a beclouded atmosphere and sees all things through a distorted medium. How wise and charitable, how just, the counsel, "Do not judge thy neighbour until thou hast stood in his place." The Arab proverb about standing on the wall and trusting to Allah is re-echoed in this Talmudic precept, "Do not stand in a place of danger, trusting in miracles."