"Only hyenas and crocodiles eat their kind," he said, "also certain fishes." (There was a general shudder, for amongst the N'Gombi to be likened to a fish is a deadly insult.) "Cannibals I do not like, and they are hated by the King's Government. Therefore when it comes to my ears--and I have many spies--that you chop man, whether he be enemy or friend, I will come quickly and I will flog sorely; and if it should again happen I will bring with me a rope, and I will find me a tree, and there will be broken huts in this land." Again they shuddered at the threat of the broken hut, for it is the custom of the N'Gombi to break down the walls of a dead man's house to give his spirit free egress. Sanders carried away with him the chief of the village, with leg-irons at his ankles, and in course of time the prisoner arrived at a little labour colony on the coast, where he worked for five years in company with other indiscreet headmen who were suffering servitude for divers offences. They called Sanders in the Upper River districts by a long and sonorous name, which may be euphemistically translated as "The man who has a faithless wife," the little joke of Bosambo, chief of the Ochori, and mightily subtle because Sanders was wedded to his people. North and south, east and west, he prowled. He travelled by night and by day. Sometimes his steamer would go threshing away up river, and be watched out of sight by the evil-doing little fishing-villages. "Go you," said Sarala, who was a little headman of the Akasava, "go you three hours' journey in your canoe and watch the river for Sandi's return. And at first sign of his steamer--which you may see if you climb the hill at the river's bend--come back and warn me, for I desire to follow certain customs of my father in which Sandi has no pleasure." He spoke to two of his young men and they departed. That night by the light of a fire, to the accompaniment of dancing and drum-beating, the son of the headman brought his firstborn, ten hours old, squealing noisily, as if with knowledge of the doom ahead, and laid it at his father's feet. "People," said the little chief, "it is a wise saying of all, and has been a wise saying since time began, that the firstborn has a special virtue; so that if we sacrifice him to sundry gods and devils, good luck will follow us in all our doings." He said a word to the son, who took a broad-bladed spear and began turning the earth until he had dug a little grave. Into this, alive, the child was laid, his little feet kicking feebly against the loose mould. "Oh, gods and devils," invoked the old man, "we shed no blood, that this child may come to you unblemished." The son stirred a heap of loose earth with his foot, so that it fell over the baby's legs; then into the light of the fire stepped Sanders, and the chief's son fell back.