the solitary grave of a Christian in unconsecrated ground. More melancholy objects of the kind can scarcely be imagined than two such graves which I have seen in different parts of the colony, each standing alone in a field, protected, it is true, with a railing, from being trodden on by cattle, or disturbed by the plough, but without any sacred emblem that should relieve the secular character of the desolation.
Though the natives often plagued us, lying about in the verandahs and asking us for all sorts of things which we did not choose to give them, yet, when we had seen none of them for any length of time, we missed their fun and frolic, and felt somewhat as people do whose children are gone to school. Especially we regretted the loss of their willing feet, since they were always ready to act as messengers, and carriers of letters or "paper talk," as such missives are styled by the natives, in the safe conveyance of which they show great fidelity. I never heard of letters being lost by any native to whom they had been entrusted, and if it should occur that a native with letters in his charge is prevented from continuing his journey, he invariably passes them on to another of his tribe, who transmits them safely to the hands of the persons for whom they were intended. The value of such trustworthiness can be easily understood in a country thinly peopled, where the nearest post-office is often very far away.
One morning of excessive heat it so happened that I commissioned a nephew of Khourabene's, named Ned, to carry a letter to the house of a colonist who lived eleven miles from Barladong. My courier was accompanied
