These rumours were circulated in Weenen division before the Natives were officially notified of their obligation to pay the poll tax. In view of the mystery that still attaches to this extraordinary incident, it may be of interest, as showing the working of a Native's mind, to compare it with a somewhat similar one in Kaffraria, Cape Colony, which reached its climax in February, 1857. It will be remembered that many thousands of cattle of those parts had recently been swept away by disease; that a Native fanatic, Mhlakaza, thereafter came forward and urged the people to destroy their cattle, desist from cultivation, etc.; and that, after complying with the insane order, some 25,000 Natives are estimated to have perished from starvation, whilst 100,000 went out of the Colony in search of food. An official statement was made in April, 1858, by a prophetess, niece of this man Mhlakaza (then deceased). This is so cleverly descriptive of the stuff in which Native superstition has its roots, and has such obvious affinity with the Zulu propaganda of 1905, that it is inserted hereunder in some detail.[82] An article dealing, _inter alia_, with superstitions connected with the Matabele Rebellion, 1896, will be found in Appendix X. It may be argued that the command to kill off pigs and fowls arose in a way similar to that made public by Mhlakaza. But in that case the origin was traced to strangers who communicated their messages to a particular girl, who, in her turn, referred to Mhlakaza, a well-known man. In the pig-and-white-fowl-killing affair, the order seems to have originated with emissaries, careful not to sow the seed in places from which its origin could be traced by the white race. Only by employing secret agents, and making a thorough investigation extending over six weeks, could those who toured Weenen division be traced and apprehended. It is the easiest thing in the world for a stranger, especially if a Native, to utter an alarming rumour to other Natives,--who are an extremely credulous people,--and give out at, say, each of half-a-dozen places that he had heard it in some manner which, in fact, is entirely fictitious. For instance, in the year 1900, a rumour was started in the Lower Tugela division that all pigs were to be killed. An official meeting of Chiefs was promptly called to investigate, but whilst the originator's whereabouts could not be traced, the fact that attention had been publicly directed to the rumour at once put a stop to its further circulation.