"You too must swear," said Ghamba, looking at Langley.
"Yes, I swear."
"Very well," said Ghamba, "I will tell you everything, but you must both remember what you have sworn to."
"Yes, all right," said Whitson. Ghamba then looked at Langley, who repeated the words.
"I will tell you," said Ghamba, "all I can remember, and you can ask questions, which I shall answer truly. You have heard of Umdava, who used to eat men in Natal long ago, after the wars of Tshaka—well, he was my uncle. After Umdava had been killed and his people scattered, my father, with a few followers, came to live amongst these mountains. But we found that after having eaten human flesh we could enjoy no other food, so we caught people and ate them. These two men lying dead are my sons, and that woman is my daughter. My four wives were here to-night. They are very old women. Have you not seen them?" he asked, looking at Whitson.
"They are in there; I shot them," said Whitson, pointing to the cave.
"I had other children," continued Ghamba, quite unmoved, "but we ate them when food was scarce."
"Have you always lived, all these years, on human flesh?" asked
Whitson.
"No, not always; but whenever we could obtain it we did so. There is other food in these mountains. Honey, ants' eggs, roots, and fruit; besides game, which is, however, not very easy to catch. But we have often all had to go away and work when times have been bad. Besides, I have a herd of cattle at a Basuto kraal, and I have been in the habit of taking some of these now and then, and exchanging them for corn, which the women then went to fetch. But we have always tried to get people to eat, because we could enjoy no other kind of food. Sometimes we got them easily; and when we were very fortunate we used to dry part of the meat by hanging it up and lighting a fire underneath, with green wood, so as to make plenty of smoke."
"Have you killed many white people?" asked Whitson.