Nada the Lily

r, I feared greatly for the hour when it should awake. For the secret was known by two women-Unandi, Mother of the

ka, the king, and of Baleka, and the grandson of Unandi. So it happened that very often one or the other of them would come into my hut, making pretence to visit my wives, and take the boy upon her lap and fondle

?" he asked of me. "Cannot she kiss me, if she wil

trong; there was no such lad of his years for a day's journey round. But from a babe he was somewhat surly, of few words, and like his father, Chaka, afraid of n

than any woman of my people whom I have seen. Her mother, Macropha, my wife, was of Swazi blood, and was brought to the king's kraal with other captives after a raid, and given to me as a wife by the king. It was said that she was the daughter of a Swazi headman of the tribe of the Halakazi, and that she was born of his wife is true, but whether he was her father I do not know; for I have heard from the lips of Macropha herself, that before she was born there was a white man staying at her father's kraal. He was a Por

and wandered; they thought one thought and spoke with one tongue. Ou! it was pretty to

and on, singing as they went, till at length they found the berries, and ate heartily. Then it was near sundown, and when they had eaten they fell

as, "we must seek the kraa

and finding berries ate them, then walked again. All that day they wandered, till at last the night came down, and they plucked branches of trees and piled the branches over them for warmth, and they were so weary that they fell asl

die, my broth

me to die, sister, when Death chooses us. See, now! Do you res

unger, cold, and weariness. She lay upon the ground like one asleep, and over her stood a jackal that fled as he drew nigh. Now it would seem that there were but two shoots to the stick of Umslopogaas. One was to save himself, and the other to lie down and die by Nada. Yet he found a third, for, undoing the strips of his moocha, he made ropes of them, and with the ropes he bound Nada on his back and started for the king's kraal. He could never have reached it, for the way was long, yet at evening some messengers running through the forest came upon a naked lad wi

e and lived upon what she could kill or steal or dig up with her hands. Now this woman was mad. For it had chanced that her husband had been "smelt out" by the witch-doctors as a worker of magic against the king, and slain. Then Chaka, according to custom, despatched the slayers to eat up his kraal, and they came to the kraal and killed his people. Last of all they killed his children, three young girls, and would have assegaied their mother, when suddenly a spirit entered into her at the sight, and she went mad, so that they let her go, b

in her cave, for she came out by night only, like a jackal. Then the woman stepped forth, smelling blood and having a spear in her hand. Presently she saw Nada seated upon the grass weaving flowers, and crept towards her to kill her. Now as she came-so the child told me-suddenly a cold wind seemed to breathe upon Nada, and fea

pierce her. Umslopogaas had no spear, he had nothing but a little stick without a knob; yet with it he rushed at the mad woman and struck her so smartly on the arm that she let go of the girl and turned on him with a yell. Then, lifting her spear, she struck at him, but he leapt aside. Again she struck; but he sprang into

r, shouting. She lifted a great stone and hurled it at him-so hard that it flew into fragments against another stone which it struck; yet he charged on, and smote at her so truly t

the king or those who did the king's bidding. Moreover, I said, if the woman had a spirit, it was an evil one, for no good spirit would ask the lives of children, but rather those of cattle, for it is against our custom to sacrifice human beings to the Amatonga even in war, though the Basuta dogs do so.

to bring evil on the royal house. Chaka asked if he would bring evil on him, the king. They in turn asked the spirits, and answered no, not on him, but on one of the royal house who should be after him. C

to say as to why thou shouldst n

lopogaas; "that I stabbed the w

ore kill me or those whom I sent? The Itongo in the woman was a Spirit King and ordered h

; "the woman would have murdered my si

hould I not also order all within thy gates to be killed with thee? May not, th

because of the word of the doctors. But the boy Umslopogaas looked up and answe

hat this woman should be slain. Those whom thou didst send to destroy her spared her, because they thought her mad. I have carried out the

tle be given to this boy with the heart of a man; his father s

thank the king because he need not pa

egan to grow angry, th

was, so is this boy. Go on, lad, in that path, and thou mayst find those who shall cry the royal salute of

, for they were ill-pleased and foreboded evil. Also they were jealous of