PRKSIDENTIAL ADDRESS SECTION E. 83 



them something of his spirit, and throws them to the ground 

 on a mat, saying " Mamoo " ! He looks at them intently^ 

 wanting to know what they have revealed. He then begins 

 to explain what they say, always following the well-known 

 rnles of interpretation, though he may display a considerable 

 amount of individual imagination in his explanation. 



The astragalus bone can fall in four different ways. 

 It can show its convex side. This is the positive position, 

 and in that case the person indicated by the bone is on his 

 legs, standing, living, healthy, active. If the astragalus falls 

 in the opposite way, showing its concave face, it is the 

 negative position, and the person represented by it is on his 

 back, ill, powerless, dead perhaps. These are the two prin- 

 cipal positions^ corresponding to the upper face or the lower 

 face of the bone respectively. But it can also fall and show 

 its right side, which is slightly inflated. This means that 

 the chest is fidl, the person indicated is full of anger, or 

 courage, or hostility. He is like a cat which spits and is 

 readj^ to tear ; whilst the opposite side, the left side, is called 

 " minkono," the elbows, and figures a person peacefully 

 leaning on his elbows in a quiet mood. 



The diviner knows the case which has been brought to 

 him, and he looks to his bones on the mat to see if there is 

 any correlation between the Avay they fall and the given case. 

 If not, he will say: " The bones have not spoken; let us try 

 again." Shoidd they refuse " to speak," he goes to another 

 place behind the hut, on the square, to try again, till he sees 

 some correspondence between their disposition and the subject 

 on which he must give advice or foretell something. 



I have published and figured some of these cases in 

 Volume II of " The Life of a South African Tribe " a910),* 

 the case of the sick mother, of the Sikororo battle amongst 

 the Xkuiias, the prophecy of a migration, etc., and I cannot 

 do more here than refer to those plates and to their inter- 

 pretation. If my readers care to study them, I am sure they 

 will confess that this system of divination is marvellously 

 clever, and quite capable of producing conviction in the mind 

 of anybody, on one condition at least, viz., if he admits the 

 magic principles which are at the base of the whole affair. 

 If really " comparison is reason," if really like acts on like, 

 then the astragalus of a goat can perfectly represent the fate 

 of a mother, and the stone of the crocodile predict her fate. 



The native is from his birth convinced of the truth of 

 these principles, and therefore these bones are for him the 

 most precious guide in life, the great inspirer and the great 

 helper — his Bible, as one of them told me one day, and more 

 than the Bible, as he added. He consults them constantly. 

 Practically no disease is treated, no religious act performed, 

 no travel undertaken without consultation of bones. 



* Copies of this I)ook can l)e obtained from A. W. Bayly & Co., 

 Loureu^o Marqvies. 



