CHAPTER IV.
THE STORY OF MUATA They went from the wide estuary into the true river, with a width that opened out at times to twenty miles; and while the white men sweltered on the sticky decks, the rescued man grew in strength.
When they reached Stanley Pool his skin was like satin again, with a polish on it from the palm-oil he rubbed in continually.
And when he found his strength he found use for his tongue, and in the speech he made to his rescuers.

Mr.Hume caught the meaning of a few words of Bantu, Compton detected a phrase or two in Arabic, and Venning, who had been schooling himself since they passed Banana Point at the river mouth, picked out other words in the tongue of the river tribes.
The meaning of his speech, when they had made a mosaic of the different understood facts, was this--that he was a great man in his own land, but only a child now, being without arms or men, but that if the white men ever came to his place, he would be a father and a mother to them.

He would throw his shield before them, and protect them with bow and spear.
After this they sat together learning a polyglot speech that would serve roughly as a medium of exchange.
And this was the story of the chief, slowly put together out of these talks-- "I am Muata the chief.

The kraal of my house is toward the setting sun, but the fire no longer burns on the hearth.

The men-robbers fell upon the place in the early morning.