Having been tried and condemned by the Nyangas, or witch-doctors, these poor wretches were now doomed to die.  Indeed, not content with thus destroying the heads of the tribe, present and to come, for three generations, all their descendants and collaterals had already been wiped out by Dingaan, so that he might pose as sole heir to the family cattle.

Such were the dreadful cruelties that happened in Zululand in those days.

CHAPTER XIV

THE PLAY

The doomed three were driven by their murderers into the centre of the depression, within a few yards of which Hans and I were standing.

After them came the head executioner, a great brute who wore a curiously shaped leopard-skin cap—­I suppose as a badge of office—­and held in his hand a heavy kerry, the shaft of which was scored with many notches, each of them representing a human life.

“See, White Man,” he shouted, “here is the bait which the king sends to draw the holy birds to you.  Had it not been that you needed such bait, perhaps these wizards would have escaped.  But the Black One said the little Son of George, who is named Macumazahn, needs them that he may show his magic, and therefore they must die to-day.”

Now, at this information I turned positively sick.  Nor did it make me feel better when the youngest of the victims, hearing the executioner’s words, flung himself upon his knees, and began to implore me to spare him.  His grandfather also addressed me, saying: 

“Chief, will it not be enough if I die?  I am old, and my life does not matter.  Or if one is not sufficient, take me and my son, and let the lad, my grandson, go free.  We are all of us innocent of any witchcraft, and he is not even old enough to practise such things, being but an unmarried boy.  Chief, you, also, are young.  Would not your heart be heavy if you had to be slain when the sun of your life was still new in the sky?  Think, White Chief, what your father would feel, if you have one, should he be forced to see you killed before his eyes, that some stranger might use your body to show his skill with a magic weapon by slaying the wild things that would eat it.”

Now, almost with tears, I broke in, explaining to the venerable man as well as I could that their horrible fate had nothing to do with me.  I told him that I was innocent of their blood, who was forced to be there to try to shoot vultures on the wing in order to save my white companions from a doom similar to their own.  He listened attentively, asking a question now and again, and when he had mastered my meaning, said with a most dignified calmness: