236 JOURNEY WITHOUT MAPS

an easy idea to convey to someone who had never
seen an ordinary train. "Very remarkable," he said
coldly and disbelievingly at the end of it and changed
the subject by humming God Save the King. The
boy with the gun walked behind and last followed
the tiny piccaninny in the transparent vest. Victor
Prosser walked very slowly, and with some pain,
because he wore backless slippers for the sake of his
prestige as head teacher of Toweh-Ta.

He asked my cousin to join him in singing God
Save the King, which the Catholic missionaries on
the Coast had taught him; I can't imagine why, for
they were all of them Irish. He said he knew some
Protestant hymns and insisted they should sing
Onward, Christian Soldiers together as they picked
their way through the Liberian jungle. When I
joined them he and his two schoolboys were singing
the Liberian national anthem:

All hail, Liberia, hail I

All hail, Liberia, haill

This glorious land of liberty shall long be ours,

Tho' new her name, green be her fame,

And mighty be her powers.

In joy and gladness with our hearts united,

We'll shout the freedom of a land benighted.

Long live Liberia, happy land,

A home of glorious liberty by God's command,

All hail, Liberia, hail!

All hail, Liberia, hail!

In unioa.strong success is sure, we cannot fail

With God above our rights to prove.