Chap. IV. POPULAR BELIEF. 1 1 1 



At times the Pondoro employs his acquired powers in 

 hunting for the benefit of the village; and after an ab- 

 sence of a day or two, his wife smells the lion, takes a 

 certain medicine, places it in the forest, and there quickly 

 leaves it, lest the lion should kill even her. This medi- 

 cine enables the Pondoro to change himself back into a 

 man, return to the village, and say, " Go and get the 

 game that I have killed for you." Advantage is of 

 course taken of what a lion has done, and they go and 

 bring home the buffalo or antelope killed when he was a 

 lion, or rather found when he was patiently pursuing his 

 course of deception in the forest. We saw the Pondoro 

 of another village dressed in a fantastic style, with 

 numerous charms hung round him, and followed by a 

 troop of boys who were honouring him with rounds of 

 shrill cheering. 



It is believed also that the souls of departed chiefs 

 enter into lions, and render them sacred. On one 

 occasion, when we had shot a buffalo in the path beyond 

 the Kafue, a hungry lion, attracted probably by the smell 

 of the meat, came close to our camp, and roused up all 

 hands by his roaring. Tuba Mokoro, imbued with the 

 popular belief that the beast was a chief in disguise, 

 scolded him roundly during his brief intervals of silence. 

 " You a chief, eh ? You call yourself a chief, do you ? 

 What kind of chief are you to come sneaking about in the 

 dark, trying to steal our buffalo meat ! Are you not 

 ashamed of yourself ? A pretty chief truly ; you are like 

 the scavenger beetle, and think of yourself only. You 

 have not the heart of a chief; why don't you kill your 

 own beef? You must have a stone in your chest, and no 

 heart at all, indeed ! " Tuba Mokoro producing no im- 

 pression on the transformed chief, one of the men, the 

 most sedate of the party, who seldom spoke, took up the 

 matter, and tried the lion in another strain. In his slow 



