274 NATIVE DOCTORS. Chap. XIII. 



They could not cure him, and pronounced the disease 

 incurable. An old doctress from the Manyeti tribe had 

 come to see what she could do for him, and on her skill 

 he now hung his last hopes. She allowed no one to see 

 him, except his mother and uncle, making entire seclusion 

 from society an essential condition of the much longed-for 

 cure. He sent, notwithstanding, for the Doctor; and on 

 the following day we all three were permitted to see him. 

 He was sitting in a covered wagon, which was enclosed by 

 a high wall of close-set reeds; his face was only slightly 

 disfigured by the thickening of the skin in parts, where 

 the leprosy had passed over it; and the only peculiarity 

 about his hands was the extreme length of his finger- 

 nails, which, however, was nothing very much out of the way, 

 as all the Makololo gentlemen wear them uncommonly long. 

 He has the quiet, unassuming manners of his father, Sebi- 

 tuane, speaks distinctly, in a low pleasant voice, and ajipears 

 to be a sensible man, except perhaps on the subject of his 

 having been bewitched; and in this, when alluded to, he 

 exhibits as firm a belief as if it were his monomania. 

 " Moriantsiane, my aunt's husband, tried the bewitching- 

 medicine first on his wife, and she is leprous, and so is her 

 head-servant ; then, seeing that it succeeded, he gave me a 

 stronger dose in the cooked flesh of a goat, and I have had 

 the disease ever since. They have lately killed Ponwane, 

 and, as you see, are now killing me." Ponwane had died of 

 fever a short time previously. Sekeletu asked us for medi- 

 cine and medical attendance, but we did not like to take 

 the case out of the hands of the female physician already 

 employed, it being bad policy to appear to undervalue any 

 of the profession ; and she, being anxious to go on with her 

 remedies, said "She had not given him up yet, but would 



