The parents of Sagbe and Tarhoh have agreed that when the boy and girl are old enough, they shall marry; and Kape, the father of Sagbe, has to pay over part of the purchase-price. Although Sagbe is but a little more than half grown, he is impatient to get married, and keeps urging it upon his father. So one day Kape bids the boy help him dress a young bullock he intends to sell as meat in the village. “When we have finished, I will give you a final answer,” says Kape. He tells Sagbe to drive an iron peg as high as he can reach into the tree under which the bullock is tethered. Kape fells the bullock with his axe, and ropes its hind-legs. Then he bids Sagbe lift the carcass and hang it on the peg in the tree. Sagbe can raise the carcass only a few feet. Then Kape seizes the carcass and lightly hangs it on the peg. “Because you are a boy, you are not able to do the work of a man... This is the reason I cannot agree to your marrying.” Sagbe knows now that what his father often says is true, — “Forward boys are not men.”