chap, xv.] SUMMARY JUSTICE FOR HIGH TREASON. 403 
saved by my intervention, and his manner of thanking 
me was by begging most pertinaciously for the rifle 
that I had refused him on more than twenty occasions. 
I requested him never to mention the subject again, as 
I would not part with it under any circumstances. 
Just at this moment I heard an uproar outside my gate, 
and loud screams, attended with heavy blows. A man 
was dragged past the entrance of the court-yard bound 
hand and foot, and was immediately cudgelled to 
death by a crowd of natives. This operation con¬ 
tinued for some minutes, until his bones had been 
thoroughly broken up by the repeated blows of clubs. 
The body was dragged to a grove of plantains, and 
was there left for the vultures, who in a few minutes 
congregated around it. 
It appeared that the offence thus summarily punished 
was the simple act of conversing with some of the 
natives who had attended Mahommed’s men from 
Fowooka’s island to Kisoona: a conversation with one 
of the enemy was considered high treason, and was 
punished with immediate death. In such cases where 
either Kamrasi or his brother M‘Gambi determined 
upon the sudden execution of a criminal, the signal 
was given by touching the condemned with the point 
of a lance : this sign was the order that was imme¬ 
diately obeyed by the guards who were in attendance, 
and the culprit was beaten to death upon the spot. 
Sometimes the condemned was touched by a stick 
instead of a lance point; this was a signal that he 
should be killed by the lance, and the sentence was 
carried out by thrusting him through the body with 
numerous spears—thus the instrument used to slay 
the criminal was always contrary to the sign. 
On the day following this event, drums were beating, 
horns blowing, and crowds of natives were singing 
and dancing in all directions; pots of plantain cider 
were distributed, and general festivities proclaimed the 
joy of the people at the news that Mahommed’s party 
had retreated across the river, according to their agree- 
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