NATIVES OF BRITISH CENTRAL AFRICA 439 
In some tribes fire is carefully extinguished on the hearth and made anew 
by friction when a death or a birth takes place; at the beginning of the hoeing 
season and at harvest. 
It is an interesting consideration whether fire was known to the earth before 
man first made it accidentally, and then of set purpose. I think it was, in Central 
Africa at any rate; and this through the action of lightning. Again and again 
in the great thunderstorms at the end of the dry season cases have occurred, 
under the observation of Europeans, of lightning striking a living tree or dead 
tree-stump, setting it on fire and communicating the flames to the surrounding 
herbage, thus starting a bush-fire. This action of the lightning is of almost 
yearly occurrence, even so far as our limited records go. Therefore it is quite 
possible that in the drier parts of East Africa bush-fires may have occurred 
year after year from natural causes alone without man’s intervention : and that 
even from this cause man may have become acquainted with fire and the effects 
of fire before he had evolved the art of fire-making. Fire may even have been 
preserved from one of these annual conflagrations for days, weeks, months 
afterwards until it became such a necessity to man that the human mind sought 
eagerly for a means of creating this force without waiting for the hazardous 
accident of a thunderstorm. 1 So the sparks from the chipped flints and the 
kindling tinder made in boring into hard wood would suggest the means 
of accomplishing the first miracle. 
Most of the natives in this part of Africa ascribe the causes of disease 
and death in the first place to witchcraft and secondly to the direct action of 
God. They draw a marked distinction between death from disease—which 
usually means death from witchcraft—and death from accident or in warfare. 
These are more or less the acts of God and not to be helped, though sometimes 
an accident may be ascribed to a person having been bewitched, especially if it 
is a man out hunting and death has been due to wild beasts. In this respect 
the belief in “ were ” animals, that is to say in human beings who have changed 
themselves into lions or leopards or some such harmful beasts, is nearly universal. 
Moreover there are individuals who imagine they possess this power of assuming 
the form of an animal and killing human beings in that shape. 
I remember a case which occurred at Chiromo soon after we commenced the 
administration of the Protectorate. A series of murders and mutilations took 
place in the vicinity of the native village. At last they were traced to an old 
man who, it was found, concealed himself in long grass near the route to the 
river side and when solitary passers-by came near him he would leap at them 
unawares and stab them. He then mutilated their bodies. He was caught 
almost red-handed and abundant evidence was given as to his being the author 
of every one of these crimes : but the old man himself talked very freely about 
the whole matter and admitted having committed the murders. He could not 
help it (he said) as he had a strong feeling at times that he was changed into 
a lion and was impelled, as a lion, to kill and mutilate. 2 
Nevertheless though the natives ascribe death in so many cases to the 
extraneous action of other persons as well as to an evil spirit they have much 
1 Bush-fires of this kind may even have taught early man the advantages of cooking. Following 
in their track he would come upon roasted rats, small antelopes, and birds which he would find singularly 
toothsome. 
3 As according to our view of the law he was not a sane person he was sentenced to be detained 
“ during the chiefs pleasure” and this “ were-lion ” has been most usefully employed for years in perfect 
contentment keeping the roads of Chiromo in good repair. 
