"On the other hand," said the colonel, "I am half-sorry I didn't allow the mountain-men to wipe the savages out.
"But," he continued, "that Ju-Ju monarch is no more to be restrained from sacrificing his subjects than a cat could be from catching sparrows. Now he'll go on till he gets hold of some whites and massacres these. Then there will be another war. If we do not kill the king, he'll be sent down to the coast and imprisoned for life."
"I follow you," said Flint. "What next?"
"Oh, annexation of course, and the whole of this rich and lovely country will become ours.
"What do you think of its healthiness?" he added, turning to Dr. Grant.
"Give a dog a bad name," replied Grant, "and you may kill him as soon as you like. When we annex this land of Benin, the niggers under our kindly sway—and they swarm in millions, you know—will till it and drain it for us; cut down useless jungles, fell valuable timber, which will help to dry up the creeks and bogs. All unhealthiness will then vanish, sir, like the morning mist from the mountain tops; land will be cheap and good, and colonists will come from Scotland by the shipload. As for sickness, we shall have splendid sanatoriums far away among those lofty mountains, where the climate must be temperate, and even bracing."
"Capital, Dr. Grant! Capital! Just my own ideas," said the colonel, "only expressed in far prettier language than any I could use. And now, Flint, what say you to stay for a week here, while we explore the country as Moses did the Holy Land?"
"Oh, Colonel Fraser," cried Creggan laughing, "it wasn't Moses, but Caleb and Joshua. Poor Moses only had a bird's-eye view of it from a hill-head, you remember."
"Quite right, boy, and thank you. Well, Flint, suppose you and I on this occasion go and spy out the land, which must eventually be ours, you know."
"Good!" said the commander. "We shall go in peace, and with peace-offerings for the people."