up the Groan-Maker, when certain councillors of the people flung

themselves in between them, crying, "Hold!"

"Is not this your law, ye councillors," said Umslopogaas, "that,

having conquered the chief of the People of the Axe, I myself am

"That is our law indeed, stranger," answered an aged councillor, "but

this also is our law: that now you must do battle, one by one, with

all who come against you. So it was in my father's time, when the

grandfather of him who now lies dead won the axe, and so it must be