One day when they were cutting the very long grass in the back of the garden, there was a sudden cry, “Mvom!” (python). Lying in the grass was a monster python with several coils around a dog which it was preparing to swallow. It was a dog that we all knew, the only one of a respectable size in the community. Being preoccupied with the dog, and partly hidden in the grass, it did not seem to pay any attention to the boys. About twenty-five of them remained to watch it while fifty came to call me. Baraka was well provided with various firearms, but there was not a single piece that would actually shoot. As a rule the appearance was all that was really necessary. But in a real emergency this left something to be desired. Finding myself without a weapon I went to the garden and looked at the monster snake, and when I saw that it did not seem disposed to leave so fine a supper I cautioned the boys to keep away from it while I ran to an English trading-house—_Hatton & Crokson’s_—in search of a weapon. The traders were as defenseless as the mission. The manager, however, recalled that there was in his possession a pistol, a precious affair, belonging to the firm. I waited exactly half an hour while he put it “in perfect condition,” and loaded it. I kept on waiting while he stood with it in his hand telling me what a fine weapon it was, instructing me in its use, and especially requesting that I should bring it back myself and not entrust it to a native for reasons which he fully explained. I then returned to the mission wondering whether the python might not take a fancy to something more delicate than a poor dog, and how many boys a python would hold. But it was still coiled about the dog not having finished crunching his bones. I crept very close, took deadly aim and fired. Deafening silence! The pistol did not go off. Again I pulled the trigger, with the same result, and again, and again. I withdrew in disgust. It was the only big game that I had ever attempted to shoot; and I had already considered what I would do with the skin. The older boys and several men who were present had been eager all the while to attack it with their cutlasses; and I now gave them permission. They formed in line. One man was to strike first, back of the head, and all the rest instantly to follow. It had lain quiet so long and was so very sluggish that one could hardly conceive that it was alert; but at the first stroke, before the other cutlasses fell, it had gone like a flash. We could only guess at its size; but I have vowed never to record my guess. Pythons have been actually measured in Gaboon at thirty feet.