They were a fierce people who lived far up north across the Great River, the remnants of a race that had once "ruled the world." Her grandfathers used to say that they were not always cannibals, but had become so long before because of a lack of food and now had acquired the taste.

It was for this purpose that they still raided to get other people to eat, since their ruler would not allow them to eat one another.

The flesh of cattle they did not care for, although they had plenty of them, but sometimes they ate goats and pigs because they said they tasted like man.

According to her grandfathers they were a very evil people and full of magic.
All of this the old woman told us quite briskly after she had drunk the water, I think because her wound had mortified and she felt no pain.

Her information, however, as is common with the aged, dealt entirely with the far past; of the history of the Amahagger since the days of her forebears she knew nothing, nor had she seen anything of Inez.