brightly on the ruined masses of masonry, streaming over the rolling ocean waves, lighting up the date and palmyra trees, with their long fan-like leaves, and showing the group eagerly bending over the gold, while stiff and stark beside them lay the dead body of the Kaffir, Noti. Then came a warning cry from the Matabele warrior, and the next moment a line of dusky savages, armed with their assegais and war-clubs, swept round them. It was a peculiarity of the missionary's never to lose the quiet calmness of his manner, under any circumstances, however trying. The greater the danger the more quiet, cool, and methodical he seemed to become. Unarmed, for their rifles were in the canoe, and consequently utterly defenceless, the whole party stood among the ruins of Sofala, surrounded by the warriors of the Arab tribe, while Wyzinski, as if nothing more than ordinary had happened, seated himself on a ruined slab, more accurately to examine the bar of gold. The old chief Achmet advanced, and using the Arab tongue, addressed the soldier, who felt none of the stern coolness of the missionary. "I thought the white men were not merchants, and refused gold," the old man remarked. "They are then thieves who rob, and not fair traders who barter." "We found the gold by chance, chief." The Arab laughed. "The white men came down the river by chance, to the very spot where we find from time to time the gold buried; by chance they dig for it and find it. Let them not laugh at an old man, whose grey hairs will not bear it. Mashallah, let them give back the gold, or my children take it." "You are welcome, chief," replied the soldier, taking the bar from Wyzinski, who seemed sunk in reverie, and giving it to Achmet. "And now withdraw your warriors, and let us finish what we are about." "Are the white men murderers as well as gold seekers?" asked Achmet Ben Arif, pointing to the dead body which lay dark and motionless in the moonlight. "Look for yourself, chief. The wounds will tell their own tale," answered the other. The old man bent over the corpse, putting his hand on the torn face, and feeling the broken ribs. His fingers followed the wounds for several minutes, then rising, "It is a lion which has done this," he said. "It is, chief," and Hughes told how the death had occurred. Achmet turned to his warriors, spoke a few words with them, when they retired, vanishing among the trees as silently as they had appeared, the old chief alone remaining. "And you say," asked Wyzinski, "that you often find worked and smelted gold here?" "Yes," replied the chief, "often." "It is Portuguese, and wherever they have drawn it from is the country we seek, the ancient Ophir of Solomon. There can be no doubt of that." "Let the white men bury their dead," answered Achmet; "and let them seek Machin, chief of Manica, and the Makoapa."