120 THE WATUTA OR ZULU KAFIRS. 
show fight against our strongest follower. Men from 
the coast are sometimes found to enter their camp 
fearlessly; but, as a rule, every race in the interior is 
in continual dread of their arrival. They have large 
boats, with which they navigate the Nyassa lake, 
landing and making raids on the people of Nyassa 
and Uhiao. The pure race adopt the costume of the 
Kafir in their extraordinary coverings ; but as they 
are made up of many who love a life of freedom, or 
had been captured from villages in childhood, the race 
must be a very mixed one. Their arms are two or 
three very small short spears, which they never throw, 
but, with a leather shield in the left hand protecting 
their own bodies, they close upon their foe ; and, if 
he resists being captured as a slave, stab him. We 
once were encamped in a village when, at night, the 
drums beat the alarm — tap, tap, slowly, increasing to 
a tremendous roll. This was to warn all that the 
Watuta were on the move in the vicinity, and might 
take this village on their way; however, they did not 
come to it till some days after we had left it, when 
the people got warning and escaped. We saw their 
camp in a circle of fence, completely surrounding a vil- 
lage, at a distance of 200 yards. Forked sticks were 
stuck in the ground to support the cow-skins which 
their women carry to shade them during the day from 
the sun. Most comfortable beddings of grass lay on 
the ground ; or, when long in one place, their huts 
were a half- orange shape, very low, and surrounded 
by a fence made from the euphorbia, which is ima- 
gined to be poisonous, and only fit for the use of the 
Watuta. 
The chief Myonga, who plundered my caravan, and 
