ZUJ-l' MEDICINE AM) MEDICINE-MEN. 37 



restore his patient by fearful concoctions of expectorants, 

 sedatives and germicides, thongli naturally with no enduring- 

 success. 



A person dying of the iXhwala is never "wailed" for, 

 because whoever cries over such a one will assuredly contract 

 tlie disease himself. This superstition Avould almost lead us to 

 believe that the natives have already observed the tendency 

 the malady has of breaking out again in the same family or 

 society, in other words, they have an idea, which they can 

 neither understand nor express, that the disease is infectious. 

 Their injunction on all and sundry to "keep their mouths 

 shut " when in the vicinity of a dead consumptive was not 

 far wrong after all. 



Consumption, of whichever type, in its incipient form, while 

 still confined to the lower end of the lung, Avould not yet be 

 recognised as iXhicdla. It would then be regarded as 

 another complaint, called islBele (the "breast" disease), from 

 the fact of the pain being felt about the nipple. In this stage 

 it is often confounded with pneumonia in the chronic form 

 leading to consumption, or with abscess or gangrene of the 

 king following pneumonia, to all of which the term isiBeh 

 might be applied. 



An acute attack of pneumonia would not be regarded as 

 the isiJBele disease, and would probably receive no more dis- 

 tinguishing designation than the generic term umKlnildane 

 omkhulu (a severe fever). 



The incipient dry cough of any form of consumption would 

 also be neither isiBele nor iXliwald, but simply uDosi — a 

 name also applied to chronic bronchitis. The uDof<i, be it 

 known, is the hair of a lion or other such " poisonous " wild 

 beast, which, having been maliciously introduced by an 

 niiiTJtahathi into the air-passages of an individual, sets up an 

 irritation resulting in a persistent dry cough. A skilful 

 medicine-man claims to be able to extract the uDosi from the 

 chest, after which feat the patient immediately recovers ! 



The prominent feature in pleurisy of a sharp, catching pain 

 in the side would cause that disease to become confused with, 



