64 
GOD'S BLACK DIAMONDS. 
struck a single blow. They got to the leopard's 
lair right enough, and made a cordon right round 
him, but when he began to growl and show his 
nasty temper and teeth and claws, someone began 
to tell how one of their neighbours had had his 
face badly mauled by an angry leopard, and the 
recital of their townsman's mishap filled them with 
a strong and dark dread lest that, or a worse thing, 
should befall any of them. To make sure they did 
not share a similar fate, they broke up and came 
back home there and then. Probably they consoled 
one another with that prized saying of the shirkers : 
He who runs away lives to fight another day.'' 
I can hardly tell you how I felt at the time over the 
excessive prudence and fears of these folks. I sup- 
pose the American saying just about hit the mark : 
I was tickled to death." Several years afterwards, 
when I was living in the Oron Country near to 
Ibaka, I had an experience quite opposite in char- 
acter. One day, when traversing the bush not far 
from the Ibaka Creek, I heard the noise of torn- 
toms, the blowing of horns, etc., and when I 
hurried in the direction of the sounds, I found some 
excited people impatiently waiting at the head of 
the creek for the arrival of the merry makers. And 
all in good time, there came in sight a large and 
gaily decorated canoe. It was full of youths from 
about sixteen to eighteen years of age. Their 
mothers had cleared them off a few days before to 
catch alive as many animals of the bush and river 
bank as they could. And they were ordered to 
carry out the instructions without stick, trap, gun, 
or weapon of any kind. They had now returned full 
of riot and joy because they had captured young 
