Chap. IX. PUBLIC RELIGIOUS SERVICES. 187 



dislike being seen at their potations by persons of the opposite 

 sex. They cut their woolly hair quite short, and delight in 

 having the whole person shining with butter. Their dress is a 

 kilt reaching to the knees ; its material is ox-hide, made as 

 soft as cloth. It is not ungraceful. A soft skin mantle is thrown 

 across the shoulders when the lady is unemployed, but when 

 engaged in any sort of labour she throws this aside, and works 

 in the kilt alone. The ornaments most coveted are large brass 

 anklets as thick as the little finger, and armlets of both brass 

 and ivory, the latter often an inch broad. The rings are so 

 heavy that the ankles are often blistered by the weight pressing 

 down ; but it is the fashion, and is borne as magnanimously as 

 tight lacing and tight shoes among ourselves. Strings of beads 

 are hung around the neck, and the fashionable colours being light 

 green and pink, a trader could get almost anything he chose for 

 beads of these colours. 



At our public religious services in the kotla, the Makololo 

 women always behaved with decorum from the first, except at the 

 conclusion of the prayer. When all knelt down, many of those 

 who had children, in following the example of the rest, bent over 

 then little ones; the children, in terror of being crushed to 

 death, set up a simultaneous yell, which so tickled the whole 

 assembly there was often a subdued titter, to be turned into a 

 hearty laugh as soon as they heard Amen. This was not so dif- 

 ficult to overcome in them as similar peccadilloes were in the case 

 of the women farther south. Long after we had settled at Ma- 

 botsa, when preaching on the most solemn subjects, a woman 

 might be observed to look round, and, seeing a neighbour seated 

 on her dress, give her a hunch with the elbow to make her move 

 off; the other would return it with interest, and perhaps the 

 remark, " Take the nasty thing away, will you ? " Then three or 

 four would begin to hustle the first offenders, and the men to 

 swear at them all, by way of enforcing silence. 



Great numbers of little trifling things like these occur, and 

 would not be worth the mention but that one cannot form a cor- 

 rect idea of missionary work except by examination of the 

 minutiae. At the risk of appearing frivolous to some, I shall 

 continue to descend to mere trifles. 



The numbers who attended at the summons by the herald, 

 who acted as beadle, were often from five to seven hundred. 



