something of their profession, and the nature and power of certain
medicines, there are others who devote their talents to some speciality.
The elephant doctor prepares a medicine which is considered indispensable
to the hunters when attacking that noble and sagacious beast; no hunter
is willing to venture out before investing in this precious nostrum. The
crocodile doctor sells a charm which is believed to possess the singular
virtue of protecting its owner from crocodiles. Unwittingly we offended
the crocodile school of medicine while at Tette, by shooting one of these
huge reptiles as it lay basking in the sun on a sandbank; the doctors
came to the Makololo in wrath, clamouring to know why the white man had
shot their crocodile.

A shark's hook was baited one evening with a dog, of which the crocodile
is said to be particularly fond; but the doctors removed the bait, on the
principle that the more crocodiles the more demand for medicine, or
perhaps because they preferred to eat the dog themselves. Many of the
natives of this quarter are known, as in the South Seas, to eat the dog
without paying any attention to its feeding. The dice doctor or diviner
is an important member of the community, being consulted by Portuguese
and natives alike. Part of his business is that of a detective, it being
his duty to discover thieves. When goods are stolen, he goes and looks
at the place, casts his dice, and waits a few days, and then, for a
consideration, tells who is the thief: he is generally correct, for he
trusts not to his dice alone; he has confidential agents all over the
village, by whose inquiries and information he is enabled to detect the
culprit. Since the introduction of muskets, gun doctors have sprung up,
and they sell the medicine which professes to make good marksmen; others
are rain doctors, etc., etc. The various schools deal in little charms,
which are hung round the purchaser's neck to avert evil: some of them
contain the medicine, others increase its power.

Indigo, about three or four feet high, grows in great luxuriance in the
streets of Tette, and so does the senna plant. The leaves are
undistinguishable from those imported in England. A small amount of
first-rate cotton is cultivated by the native population for the
manufacture of a coarse cloth. A neighbouring tribe raises the sugar-
cane, and makes a little sugar; but they use most primitive wooden
rollers, and having no skill in mixing lim