122 SEKELETU. Chap. IX. 



The court herald greeted us. This official utters all ihe 

 proclamations, calls assemblies, keeps the kotla clean and 

 the fire burning, and when a person is executed in public he 

 drags away the body. The present herald was an old man 

 who occupied the post in Sebituane's time. He stood up, and 

 after leaping, and shouting at the top of his voice, roared out 

 some adulatory sentences, as, "Don't I see the white man? 

 Don't I see the comrade of Sebituane ? Don't I see the father 

 of Sekeletu ? We want sleep. Give your son sleep, my lord." 

 The meaning of this request for sleep was that Sebituane had 

 learnt that the white men had " a pot (a cannon) in their 

 towns which would burn up any attacking party ;" and the old 

 warrior thought if he could get possession of this weapon he 

 would be able to " sleep " the rest of his days in peace. 



Sekeletu was a young man eighteen years of age, and of 

 that dark yellow or coffee-and-milk colour, of which the 

 Makololo are so proud, because it distinguishes them from the 

 black tribes on the rivers. The women long for children of 

 light colour so much that they sometimes chew the bark of a 

 certain tree in the hope that it will have this effect. To my 

 eye the dark skin is much more agreeable than the tawny 

 hue of the half-caste, which that of the Makololo closely 

 resembles. 



In height Sekeletu was about five feet seven, not so good- 

 looking nor so able ar his father, but equally friendly to the 

 English. Sebituane installed his daughter Mamochisane into 

 the chieftainship long before his death, and to prevent her 

 having a superior in a husband he told her all the men were 

 hers, that she might take any one, but ought to keep none. 

 According to a saying in the country, " the tongues of 

 women cannot be governed ;" and as she lived this free inde- 

 pendent life, they made her miserable by their remarks. One 

 paramour she selected was even called her wife, and her son 

 the child of Mamochisane's wife. The arrangement was so 

 distasteful to her, that when Sebituane was dead she declared 

 she never would consent to govern the Makololo while she 

 had a brother alive. Sekeletu wished her to retain the 

 authority, for fear that the pretensions of another member of 

 the family to the chieftainship should prevail. Three days 

 were spent in public discussion on the point. At last Mamo- 



