lyo COURTS OF UW. 



were speaking ; can't you do the same ? Do you want to 

 have it all to yourself ? " And as the audience acquiesce 

 in this bantering, and enforce silence, he goes on till he 

 has finished all he wishes to say in his defence. If he has 

 any witnesses to the truth of the facts of his defence, they 

 give their evidence. No oath is administered ; but occa- 

 sionally, when a statement is questioned, a man will say, 

 " By my father," or "By the chief, it is so." Their 

 truthfulness among each other is quite remarkable ; but 

 their system of government is such that Europeans are 

 not in a position to realise it readily. A poor man will 

 say, in his defence against a rich one, " I am astonished 

 to hear a man so great as he make a false accusation ; " 

 as if the offence of falsehood were felt to be one against 

 the society which the individual referred to had. the 

 greatest interest in upholding. 



If the case is one of no importance, the chief decides it 

 at once ; if frivolous, he may give the complainant a 

 scolding, and put a stop to the case in the middle of the 

 complaint, or he may allow it to go on without paying 

 any attention to it whatever. Family quarrels are often 

 treated in this way, and then a man may be seen stating 

 his case with great fluency, and not a soul hstening to 

 him. But if it is a case between influential men, or 

 brought on by under-chiefs, then the greatest decorum 



§ re vails. If the chief does not see his way clearly to a 

 ecision, he remains silent ; the elders then rise one by 

 one and give their opinions, often in the way of advice 

 rather than as decisions ; and when the chief finds the 

 general sentiment agreeing in one view, he delivers his 

 judgment accordingly. He alone speaks sitting ; all 

 others stand. 



No one refuses to acquiesce in the decision of the chief, 

 as he has the power of life and death in his hands, and can 

 enforce the law to that extent if he chooses ; but grum- 

 bling is allowed, and, when marked favouritism is shown 

 to any relative of the chief, the people generally are not 

 so astonished at the partiality as we would be in England. 

 This system was found as well developed among the 

 Makololo as among the Bakwains, or even better, and is 

 no foreign importation. When at Cassange, my men had 

 a slight quarrel among themselves, and came to me, as to 

 their chief, for judgment. This had occurred several 

 times before, so without a thought I went out of the 



