loo THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



oblique. It costs a great deal of trouble to teacb a servant even to 

 put a chair straight against the wall. If his attention is called to 

 the fact that things are not in order, he will at once pi'oceed to make 

 them mor^ crooked and askew than they were before. It is almost 

 impossible to teach them European trades like that of the carpenter, 

 in which straight lines are essential ; but they succeed well in giv- 

 ing symmetrical forms to any rounded or free handwork. 



The making and use of fire may be regarded as one of the primitive 

 arts of mankind. Like the ancients, the Damaras regard fire as some- 

 thing handed down from their ancestors, to be carefully preserved. 

 Every Herero werst has its sacred fire, which must never be extin- 

 guished, and which is considered the central point of the tribe and the 

 village. There is the chief's own place, the sacred objects are kept by 

 the tire, councils are held and judgments are delivered at it, the vener- 

 able ceremonial acts are consummated with its ashes, and from it are 

 taken the coals with which fires are kindled in other houses. Those 

 who go out with the herds to the cattle-stands take with them a brand 

 from the sacred fire ; and when a chief dies without direct heirs, or 

 when the sovereignty passes to another line, then the old fire is put 

 out and new fire is brought from the werst of the new chief. All the 

 members of a single family or tribe regard themselves as sitting around 

 one fire. 



The care of the fire is intrusted to the oldest unmarried daughter 

 of the chief, or, if he has no such daughter, to the maiden nearest re- 

 lated to him. If, by any accident or misfortune, it is extinguished, it 

 must not be relit from another fire, but must be made anew from the 

 beginning. For this purpose two straight sticks of any readily burn- 

 ing wood are taken. A hollow is made in one of the sticks, in which 

 the sharpened end of the other one may be twirled, and some punk 

 or half -rotten wood is put in a groove cut to hold it, to serve as tinder. 

 This stick is held to the ground by the knees, while the other one is 

 turned rapidly back and forth between the open hands. When a 

 spark appears, it is directed upon the tinder, which is then readily 

 blown into a flame. Thus, it is not the rubbed stick, but the tinder, 

 that gives the flame. The natives dislike this work very much, and 

 when on a journey, if they have no other fire apparatus, they take an 

 ignited stick with them, the fire of which they skillfully keep glowing 

 for a long time. At the present time, the Africans, far into the interior, 

 are acquainted with the use of steel and flint and of matches ; Jonko- 

 ping's paraffine-lighters have probably penetrated farther into the heart 

 of Africa than any European explorer. There is no evidence that the 

 people knew anything of the steel and flint before they became ac- 

 quainted with Europeans ; and I have never seen a fire-steel that was 

 made by a native smith. Besides cooking food and warming and 

 lighting the huts, fire is employed for the felling of large trees and 

 the splitting of stones. In the former case, the fire is built around 



