But he did discover it. He knew, and the Hyndses did not. In regard
to this same slave, a curious item was set down by Richard's son:
"'This day Black Shooba's son told me of a heathen song Shooba made
before he died and swore him to forget not. 'Tis a strange chaunt:
"I, Shooba, the Snake Soul, make me a Song.
In the night I sing it for my Snake.
My Snake showed me a Secret Thing.
Two Eyes and Two Eyes looked upon One Eye.
One Eye is open and sees, and sees not.
This my Snake showed me, in the Dark.
But the Strong Ones, the White Ones,
They have no Snake. Ho! Never shall they see it!"'
"Sounds like a stark raving, doesn't it? One can fancy the doctor
feeling a bit ashamed of himself when he wrote it down.
"I rather fancied it raving, myself, until one day I came across--"
here he paused, and looked at me intently--"a yellowed slip of paper
between the pages of an old diary that had been accidentally
discovered. I knew then that there was really something to be
discovered, and that I had not been a visionary sentimentalist when
I yielded to my mother's last expressed wish that I should come
here and search.
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