20 8 THE TRIBES ON MY FRONTIER. 



the frame of an aged bullock, which, having been discarded 

 by its owner, npw roams about my compound and the 

 country at large. The latter deserves a passing word, for 

 I cannot tell you how forcibly it strikes me, in my more 

 poetical moments, as a beautiful emblem of Liberty. Pos- 

 sessing nothing else that makes life sweet, it possesses 

 freedom, and of this neither guile nor fofce can rob it, for, 

 being in need of nothing, it is not beholden to any man, 

 and, having nothing to fear, it defies the malice of tyranny. 

 It laughs the pound to scorn, for it knows that if you send 

 it there nobody will pay two annas to redeem it ; and if, 

 on the other hand, you seek by violence to evict it, you 

 will be foiled, for stoning and cudgelling have long since 

 ceased to give rise to any unusual sensations in its battered 

 hide. It is armed against even the fear of death, for it 

 knows that its leather would not pay the municipality its 

 funeral expenses, being worn threadbare at a dozen points. 

 Or, perhaps, the thought of death has become sweet to it, 

 for its face bespeaks a sad history, and it may be illustra- 

 ting the saying of the philosopher, qui sdt mori nescit cogi. 

 Anyway it nescit cogi on that point I am clear. 



This great host of etceteras are too promiscuous to be 

 arranged in groups, and they cannot be treated singly, for 



