276 
SOUTHERN AFRICA. 
dusky £ i doctor ' ? in the centre ; these all combine 
to make the scene one of the wildest and most 
awful that can well be imagined upon earth. 
A few hours of such employment and fare as 
this suffices to bring the assembled tribe into 
a state of absolute frenzy, and fit them for 
being engaged in any scenes, or amount of bar- 
barity and cruelty. This the u witch-doctor 99 
anticipates, and so soon as he deems their 
feelings and evil passions to be sufficiently 
inflamed, he then ceases dancing, as gradually 
subsiding in time to the music, as he before 
rose and increased to that degree of rapidity 
which kept him in a motion so excessive, that 
he not unfrequently falls upon the ground, 
during his evolutions, quite exhausted. 
A solemn silence then ensues, during which 
the " doctor " rests himself, and then proceeds 
with a bundle of divining rods in his hand, to 
walk round throughout the assembly. As he 
approaches the chief, he watches the rods in his 
hand, and dexterously makes one of them move, 
or leap out, from amongst the rest. He then 
singles out this rod, and throws the others into 
the fire, and being rubbed with a kind of in- 
fl am able matter, they there crackle and blaze 
brightly, thus demonstrating to the Kaffirs that 
they are charged with supernatural powers ; with 
the remaining one he then proceeds through 
