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The rain-making business, though very lucrative, is not without its disadvantages; for whenever Moselekatse, or Dingaan, or any other chief sets his rainmaker at work, and the rain was not forthcoming as per application, the indignant ruler caused an assegai or two to be stuck through the wizard, for the encouragement of the other wizards.
And as the fence grew, Dan lent a hand here and there, the rejected and the staff indulged in glorious washing-days among the lilies of the Reach; Cheon haunted the vegetable patch like a disconsolate ghost; while Billy Muck, the rainmaker, hovered bat-like over his melons, lending a hand also with the fence when called upon.
On this occasion Dona Mercedes availed herself of the chance to extol the prowess and power of her family's idolized saint, San Miguel. She said as a rainmaker he had no equal. He disliked and objected to have himself carried about the fields when there was not a certain sign of coming rain in the heavens.
The last of the correspondents left on the evening of the day that Judge Thayer set the rainmaker to work. He sent the obituary of Ascalon, as he believed, ahead of him by wire. Not that Ascalon was as dead as it appeared on the surface, or the gamblers would make it out to be.
I'll teach these rascals to insult me!" With all this bluster, I saw that old Katchiba was in a great dilemma, and that he would give anything for a shower, but that he did not know how to get out of the scrape. It was a common freak of the tribes to sacrifice the rainmaker, should he be unsuccessful. He suddenly altered his tone, and asked, "Have you any rain in your country?"
But the wind was against the rainmaker; nature conspired to mock him before men as the quack that he was. The gloom of storm cleared from the streets of Ascalon, the worn and tired look came back into faces that had been illumined for a little while with hope. Farther away, fainter, the thunder sounded, dimmer the murmur of the withdrawing rain.
Listen to that, Smoke!" Three ancient squaws had halted midway between the bachelors' camp and the camp of McCan, and the oldest was declaiming in shrill falsetto. Smoke recognized the names, but not all the words, and Shorty translated with melancholy glee. "Labiskwee, the daughter of Snass, the Rainmaker, the Great Chief, lights her first maiden's fire to-night.
In this way, with considerable coming and going through its doors, yet all in sobriety and peace, Ascalon passed the burning, rainless summer days. But not without a little cheer in the hard glare of the parching range, not without a laugh and a chuckle, and a grin behind the hand. The town knew all about the rainmaker at work behind the shielding rows of tall corn in Judge Thayer's garden.
I replied that we had, every now and then. "How do you bring it? Are you a rainmaker?" "I don't keep mine in bottles, but I have a houseful of thunder and lightning," he most coolly replied; "but if you can bottle lightning you must understand rainmaking. "What do you think of the weather today?" I immediately saw the drift of the cunning old Katchiba; he wanted professional advice.
Similarly, when rain and other social benefits come to be regarded as gifts of the gods, the power of the rainmaker comes to be regarded as a power to procure from the gods the gifts that they have to bestow: magic is displaced by religion. The opposition of principle between magic and religion thus makes itself manifest.