354 
THE NEW AFRICA 
chiefs, however, were of a different opinion when they heard 
of the affair, and soundly rated the king for inflicting so much 
torture on a human being on his own responsibility, saying that 
he should have killed the man outright at once, and, reminding 
him that he was still young, advised him next time to bring 
a culprit before the council. 
Personally I am of opinion that this verdict of the chiefs 
was influenced more by the fact that the man was a subject of 
Khama, whom they were anxious not to offend, as torture is 
an extinct quantity under Khama’s rule, than by a pure love 
of humanity, for they themselves, at times, privately maltreat 
culprits in the most cruel manner. 
We met this man later on, passing through Mongwato. He 
bore many indelible marks from Moremi’s sjamboks, and when 
asked if he was returning to the lake to claim his goats, walked 
off with a much injured air, muttering maledictions on the lake 
and all its people. How this fellow in his injured state, stark 
naked, without even being 1 armed with a knife, managed to find 
his way and sustain his miserable life across the four hundred 
miles of desert to Mongwato is a mystery. The king had made 
sure that either lions or wolves would have settled the question 
of his existence long before he reached his native hearthstone. 
When talking of slaves amongst the natives, the term 
slave does not bear the same import as to the European mind. 
A slave is certainly the property of his master, who holds 
power over his life and working capacity; but from what 
I have seen, the position between master and slave is more 
one of relative domesticity than actual slavery. Certainly he 
must follow his master’s fortunes, and carry the bundle of 
bedding and food on the march, or help till the soil; but 
he has ‘ rights ’; the right to share in the crops, or, failing a 
personal supply of food, the right to feed out of his master’s pot, 
who invariably, when eating, passes the pot over to his slave, 
and, to his honour be it said, when food is scarce, usually, while 
eating first, stints himself in quantity that his slave may not 
complain of* hunger. Often have I witnessed this self-denial 
