ZULU WITCH DOCTORS. 313 



eminent approves of that man as a fit and proper person '.o 

 practice medicine. This is shown by the number of cases which 

 have been tried for culpable homicide, but cleared because the 

 prisoner held a Government license as a native doctor. 



To withhold the licenses from the native doctors would put 

 the Government on a more rational basis, and would enable the 

 magistrates to deal more effectually with the cases of maii- 

 slaughter by native doctors. But this would not materially im- 

 prove the conditions, medicall}', among the natives. I believe that 

 it was President Kruger who remarked that if there was a snake 

 in the grass, it did not do much good to hit the end of its tail. 

 Without a license the native doctors would continue to practise 

 medicine on the same basis as hundreds of unlicensed native 

 doctors practise now- We could not forbid them to practise 

 medicine, for the simple reason that there are no other doctors to 

 attend to the people, and the Zulu must have his medicine. 



And even if we could stop the native doctors from practising 

 it would not help matters materially. The harm that the native 

 doctor does is a very small matter compared with the good that 

 he fails to do. Thousands of natives are dying every year, and 

 thousands of others are lyings around in miserable invalidism 

 whose lives might be saved and who' might be cured, or whose 

 sicknesses might be prevented if they had proper medical attention. 

 That is the question before us to-day. I have endeavoured to 

 demonstrate not so much that the native doctors kill people 

 and injure people, but rather that they are utterly ignorant and 

 totally incompetent to treat disease. In other words, that our 

 native population — ^one of the greatest assets that Natal has — 

 though over-ridden and bullied by thousands of native doctors, 

 is practically without medical assistance in their day of trouble. 



What are we going to do about it ? 



It is not a feasible proposition to have the native p<_)pulation 

 attended by European practitioners. A comparatively few 

 natives already go to white d(x:tors for treatment occasionally, 

 and they will continue to do so. But they are, as a rule, the 

 ambulatory cases, the light cases and the chronics, and such a 

 patient will come two or three times a year to get medicine. But 

 such attention can hardly be called treatment. 



If the native population called in the European practitioners 

 on the same basis as the white population does, we would pro- 

 bably need ten times the number of doctors that we have now 

 in the colony to meet the need. 



And if the doctors were in the colony, still it wouldn't meet 

 the need, for white doctors are not going to the oiit-olf-the-way 

 places where they are most needed and live among a native 

 population away from white companionship. 



And if white doctors were found willing to live among the 

 natives away from white companionship, the native i)ractice 

 could not support them. It is all right for a native to come to 

 town once or twice a year with a ]>iiund or two in his ])ockct and 



