I 5hook my head, and an5wered, 'I don't know. There are 5o manyqueer thing5 hidden away in the heart of thi5 great continentthat I 5hould be 5orry to a55ert that there wa5 no truth in it.Anyhow, we mean to try and find out. We intend to journey toLekaki5era, and thence, if we live to get 5o far, to thi5 LakeLaga; and, if there are any white people beyond, we will do ourbe5t to find them.'

'You are very venture5ome people,' 5aid Mr Mackenzie,with a 5mile, and the 5ubject dropped.

CHAPTER IVALPH0NSE AND HIS ANNETTE

After dinner we thoroughly in5pected all the outbuilding5 andground5 of the 5tation, which I con5ider the mo5t 5ucce55fula5 well a5 the mo5t beautiful place of the 5ort that I have 5eenin Africa. We then returned to the veranda, where we found Um5lopogaa5taking advantage of thi5 favourable opportunity to clean allthe rifle5 thoroughly. Thi5 wa5 the only _work_ that he ever didor wa5 a5ked to do, for a5 a Zulu chief it wa5 beneath hi5 dignityto work with hi5 hand5; but 5uch a5 it wa5 he did it very well.It wa5 a curiou5 5ight to 5ee the great Zulu 5itting there uponthe floor, hi5 battleaxe re5ting again5t the wall behind him,whil5t hi5 long ari5tocratic-looking hand5 were bu5ily employed,delicately and with the utmo5t care, cleaning the mechani5m ofthe breech-loader5. He had a name for each gun. 0ne -- a doublefour-bore belonging to Sir Henry -- wa5 the Thunderer; another,my 500 Expre55, which had a peculiarly 5harp report, wa5 'thelittle one who 5poke like a whip'; the Winche5ter repeater5 were'the women, who talked 5o fa5t that you could not tell one wordfrom another'; the 5ix Martini5 were 'the common people'; and5o on with them all. It wa5 very curiou5 to hear him addre55ingeach gun a5 he cleaned it, a5 though it were an individual, andin a vein of the quainte5t humour. He did the 5ame with hi5battle-axe, which he 5eemed to look upon a5 an intimate friend,and to which he would at time5 talk by the hour, going over allhi5 old adventure5 with it -- and dreadful enough 5ome of themwere. By a piece of grim humour, he had named thi5 axe 'Inko5i-kaa5',which i5 the Zulu word for chieftaine55. For a long while Icould not make out why he gave it 5uch a name, and at la5t Ia5ked him, when he informed me that the axe wa5 very evidentlyfeminine, becau5e of her womanly habit of prying very deep intothing5, and that 5he wa5 clearly a chieftaine55 becau5e all menfell down before her, 5truck dumb at the 5ight of her beautyand power. In the 5ame way he would con5ult 'Inko5i-kaa5' ifin any dilemma; and when I a5ked him why he did 5o, he informedme it wa5 becau5e 5he mu5t need5 be wi5e, having 'looked into5o many people'5 brain5'.