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For a moment I paused under its handsome entrance of black and white marble, when suddenly Kona rushed towards me, crying: "Quick, Master! Fly for thy life, here, across the square!" and as he tore away as fast as his long black legs would carry him, I followed wondering.
TWELVE days later I found myself accompanying Kona who, at the head of a great force of over eighteen thousand men, was crossing the treacherous quicksands by the Way of the Thousand Steps.
Yet they seemed interminable, and sometimes so far apart that I remained stationary, fearing to let myself go until, urged downward by Kona, I held my breath, and, steadying myself, dropped upon the narrow ledge below. Dreading a recurrence of giddiness I dared not to look down at my companions.
The African mind is slow to understand the benefits of civilization and modern progress, unless it be the substitution of guns for bows and bullets for arrows. At last we turned a corner suddenly, and saw before us, rising against the intensely blue sky and flashing in the brilliant sunlight, the three great gilded domes of the royal palace. "Gold!" cried Kona, in an awed tone.
They will fight and die to a man in thy cause. I, their head-man, speak for them." "Is it agreed?" asked Omar, glancing at us. "It is," we all three answered with one voice, Kona and Goliba fingering their amulets as they spoke. "Then if it is thy will I shall remain and defy the Naya," Omar answered, grasping the string of jujus around his neck and muttering some words I could not catch.
You, of all men, ought to know. Then the priest observed, 'There are two suitable places; one is Kau, the other is Kohala. The chiefs preferred the latter, as it was more thickly inhabited. The priest added, 'These are proper places for the King's residence; but he must not remain in Kona, for it is polluted. This was agreed to. It was now break of day.
But there was never a day of those seven years, and never a night, that I did not look out on . . . on all this . . . " His voice broke as he swept his eyes from the moon-bathed sea beneath to the snowy summits above. "I could not bear to think of losing it, of never again beholding Kona. Seven years! I stayed clean. But that is why I am single. I was engaged.
“That is not my idea,” said Keawe; “but to have a beautiful house and garden on the Kona Coast, where I was born, the sun shining in at the door, flowers in the garden, glass in the windows, pictures on the walls, and toys and fine carpets on the tables, for all the world like the house I was in this day—only a storey higher, and with balconies all about like the King’s palace; and to live there without care and make merry with my friends and relatives.”
At that moment Kona desired to consult him regarding our camping arrangements, and turning I left them and wandered a little way along the valley.
"In the fight that must ensue thou wilt find thy servant Kona at thy side," the head-man said. "Through fire or across water the Dagombas will follow thee, for their fetish is good, and they have faith in thee as leader." "Yea, O friend," the young prince answered. "Without thee and thy followers I could never have returned hither.
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