CHAP. XV.] 
NATIVE WITCHES . 
411 
demurring, I at once ordered my men to pull down 
the houses, and thereby relieved myself from drunken 
and dangerous neighbours. 
Although we had been regularly supplied with beef 
by the king, we now found it most difficult to procure 
fowls; the war with Fowooka had occasioned the de¬ 
struction of nearly all the poultry in the neighbourhood 
of Kisoona, as Kamrasi and his kojoors (magicians) 
were occupied with daily sacrifices * deducing prognos¬ 
tications of coming events from the appearances of the 
entrails of the birds slain. The king was surrounded 
by sorcerers, both men and women ; these people were 
distinguished from others by witcli-like chaplets of 
various dried roots worn upon the head; some of them 
had dried lizards, crocodiles teeth, lions' claws, minute 
tortoise-shells, &c. added to their collection of charms. 
They could have subscribed to the witches' cauldron 
of Macbeth : 
“Eye of newt and toe of frog, 
Wool of bat and tongue of dog, 
Adder’s fork and blind worm’s sting, 
Lizard’s leg and owlet’s wing, 
For a charm of powerful trouble, 
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.” 
On the first appearance of these women, many of 
whom were old and haggard, I felt inclined to repeat 
Banquo's question : “ What are these, so withered and 
so wild in their attire, that look not like the inhabitants 
o' the earth, and yet are on't ? Live you ? or are you 
aught that man may question ?" 
In such witches and wizards Kamrasi and his people 
believed implicitly. Bacheeta and also my men told 
me that when my wife was expected to die during the 
attack of coup de soldi, the guide had procured a 
witch who had killed a fowl to question it, “ Whether 
she would recover and reach the lake ?" The fowl in 
its dying struggle protruded its tongue, which sign is 
considered affirmative ; after this reply the natives had 
no doubt of the result. These people, although far 
