Chap. VI. ORDEAL OF MUAVE. 167 



were smeared with white flour, and an unusual seriousness 

 marked their demeanour. Shortly before our arrival they 

 had been accused of witchcraft; conscious of innocence, 

 they accepted the ordeal, and undertook to drink the 

 poisoned muave. For this purpose they made a journey 

 to the sacred hill of Nchomokela, on which repose the 

 bodies of their ancestors ; and, after a solemn appeal to 

 the unseen spirits to attest the innocence of their children, 

 they swallowed the muave, vomited, and were therefore 

 declared not guilty. It is evident that they believe that 

 the soul has a continued existence ; and that the spirits of 

 the departed know what those they have left behind them 

 are doing, and are pleased or not according as their deeds 

 are good or evil ; this belief is universal. The owner of a 

 large canoe refused to sell it, because it belonged to the 

 spirit of his father, who helped him when he killed the 

 hippopotamus. Another, when the bargain for his canoe 

 was nearly completed, seeing a large serpent on a branch 

 of the tree overhead, refused to complete the sale, alleging 

 that this was the spirit of his father come to protest 

 against it. 



Some of the Batoka chiefs must have been men of con- 

 siderable enterprise ; the land of one, in the western part 

 of this country, was protected by the Zambesi on the S., 

 and on the N. and E. lay an impassable reedy marsh, filled 

 with water all the year round, leaving only his western 

 border open to invasion : he conceived the idea of digging 

 a broad and deep canal nearly a mile in length, from the 

 reedy marsh to the Zambesi, and, having actually carried 

 the scheme into execution, he formed a large island, on 

 which his cattle grazed in safety, and his corn ripened 

 from year to year secure from all marauders. 



Another chief, who died a number of years ago, 

 believed that he had discovered a remedy for tsetse-bitten 

 cattle ; his son Moyara showed us a plant, which was new 



