Many cases of pilfering dealt with by village headmen we might call petty thefts. Natives possess so little property that nearly all stealing from them comes under this head. Plucking the ears of corn in a field is not criminal. The person that takes a cob of maize leaves the stalk so as to convey a well-known meaning to the farmer, who as he looks at the signal is able to say, “Oh! it is a poor man that has eaten because of hunger,” or “It is my friend that has helped himself”. But if the smallest article be taken by an enemy, a disturbance arises. Natives are fairly honest among each other. When one is plundered by a companion he exclaims, “If you had stolen from a white man, then I could have understood it, but to steal from a black man——”. Several articles were once carried off from the Mission Station. As a rule, when theft is mentioned, the natives say stealing is “very bad,” “some black men do not know how to steal, other black men are very bad”. But one little fellow, on this occasion, took a milder view of the matter and said to his instructor, “Black man very poor, ma’am”. Among the older natives, however, a tendency to extenuate is seldom found, and often we see cases like that mentioned by Livingstone, where a person had to drink mwai for taking a few ears of corn. One circumstance that makes even petty theft very heinous in the eyes of the native is that the thief is identified with the Bewitchers (106). He uses “medicine” like them, and employs “horns” in the same way. He has a charm (chitaka) that enables him to go to a sleeper at night and ask, “Where are your hoes? Where are your beads?” So complete is his power over his victims, that he makes them answer all such questions without waking, and so secure does he feel that he cooks porridge and takes a meal before leaving the plundered house. So much is thief-medicine believed in that few venture to steal without seeking the proper charm. Hence it is that a thief becomes an object of disgust, and may lose his life for taking a few articles which he might have got by simply asking the owner. The native view about witches modifies the whole civil code. Any offence may be brought under the terrible crime of witchcraft. If a wife run away it is easy to convince her husband that she would not have done so but for powerful “witchery” used against her. The following statement sent me by Mr. Buchanan of Zomba will further illustrate the law of theft:—