They still retained the principal features of their ancient religions-- that of animal-worship. The serpent, the crocodile, the cat, ibis, and other animals of certain kinds were considered sacred, and rigidly protected. To kill one of these marked animals, either wantonly or accidentally, was a sacrilege, the punishment for which was death. When our heroes learnt this, and remembered their indiscriminate slaughter of the pythons, they felt themselves in a mighty perilous position should any of their friends, the amazons, betray them. Ned took an early opportunity of sounding Captain Pylea on the subject. She, however, laughingly reassured him, and told him to be under no apprehension. Her subordinates were soldiers, not informers; while, as for the slaves who had removed the carcases, they had been slaughtered to a man, so that they might not speak of what they had seen. "It was a terrible crime you committed," she added, with a shudder; "for these were of the most sacred order, who are fed with slaves. But enough were left to swallow up the remains of their brethren and those who might have spoken about it, and we did not see you do the unholy deed." Ned shuddered to hear the calmness with which she told this atrocity, grateful although he was for her and her comrades' kindness to them. She was a frank, generous, and courageous young woman, but she had not much womanly mercy in her composition. "What would you have done, Pylea, if you had been attacked by those sacred--monsters?" he enquired. She looked at him with a humorous twinkle in her dark eyes, and touched her bow and spear. "Afterwards we'd have, as I advise you to do, forgotten all about it." "Then you don't pin your faith too closely to this venerable creed of yours, Pylea?" "We expect our fathers, husbands, and brothers to venerate the gods, and attend to their religious, with their other domestic duties, while we do the thinking and the fighting," she answered significantly. "Do you know, Pylea, you belong to the emancipated sex. In my land the order is reversed." "Ah, so it might be in mine, if our men were like you and your followers. But look at ours. Could any of them bend my bow or handle my spear? No; they are too fond of their couches, their pipes, their dinners, and their wines. They like to spend their time gossiping and making pretty things. All the exercise they care for is flogging the slaves, so we leave them to what they like best--to look after the children, make poetry, pictures, and pretty carvings, and discuss new dishes, while they fill their empty heads with smoke and strong drink."