magic. Medicine, as we understand it, is not the kind 159 of medicine used by the witch doctor of East Africa, who relies more upon incantations than upon the potency of any drugs to doctor the complaints of those who seek his aid, the ailments he is expected to cure being more of a mental than a physical na
ture, as, when a native complains that some one has given him poisoned medicin
e, he really means that some one has put some spell on him to cause something to happen to him. Such is the superstitious nature of the savage that, if one has been told that he is to die at the end of three days, he will actually accept the statement as literally true, and it would have such an effect upon him
that, unless the witch doctor could convince him that he had made some medici
ne powerful enough to counteract the influence of the spell cast over him, he would certainly die at the time stated. The witch doctor also professed to be able to say what was going to happen to any one who sought the information from him, the mode of procedure in this case being to spread a leopard skin on t
he ground, and turn out upon it the contents of a calabash containing a lot of
stones, lion-claws, arrow-heads, &c. These were counted out in sections—somewhat after the style of the game children play with plum-stones in England—and from the balance remaining after the full number of even sections had been completed he read the signs. An arrow-head perhaps foretold 160 that the inq
uirer would be killed with an arrow, a lion’s claw that he would be killed by
a lion, and so on. They had also medicines for the treatment of physical ailments, and antidotes for poisons. During my visit to Mombasa I had bought a medicine-chest, which I always carried with me, so I gave the chief a taste of the different tabloids, &c. I found that he was very fond of pepper and salt, a
nd it was surprising to see him take a handful of pepper and eat it up without
winking. The natives were intensely interested in everything I possessed, and were greatly mystified by the trick of drawing t
he heat from the sun, by means of a lens from my f
ield-glasses focused on their hands, and it was remarkable how some of the warriors would stand the pain without making a sign,
letting the flesh burn without appearing to notice i
t. When I approached the chief on the question of a Pigasangi, he promised to talk the matter over with his people, and suggest
ed that we might also arrange for the ceremony o
