Justice is administered by the Chief assisted by Councillors. The Chief, however, is not absolutely bound by the advice of his Councillors. He is compelled to some adhesion to justice or to the national laws by the knowledge that his tribe will dwindle and depart from him if he gives unbearable offence. Cases of gross injustice do occur;--but on the whole the Kafir Chiefs have endeavoured to rule in accordance with Kafir customs. A certain amount of arbitrary caprice the people have been willing to endure;--but they have not been as long-suffering as the Zulus under Dingaan,--nor as the Romans under Nero. Disobedience to a Chief is punished by a fine;--but the crime has been unpopular in the tribes, and though doubtless committed daily under the rose is one of which a Kafir does not wish to have been thought guilty. The very essence of Kafir customs and Kafir life is reverence for the Chief. I cannot close this short catalogue of Kafir customs without alluding to witch-doctors and rain-makers. Witch-doctoring is employed on two occasions--1st, when a true but of course mistaken desire exists in a kraal or family village to find out who is tormenting the community by making some member or members of it ill,--and, 2nd, when some Chief has a desire to get rid of a political enemy, or more probably to obtain the cattle of a wealthy subject. In either case a priest is called in who with many absurd ceremonies goes about the work of selecting or “smelling out” a victim, whom of course he has in truth selected before the ceremonies are commenced. In the former case, after much howling and beating of drums, he names the unfortunate one, who is immediately pounced upon and tormented almost to death; and at last forced, in his own defence, to own to some kind of witchcraft. His cattle are seized which go to the Chief,--and then after a while he is purified and put upon his legs again, impoverished indeed, and perhaps crippled, but a free man in regard to the Devil which is supposed to have been driven out of him. In the second case the treatment is the same;--only that the man whose wealth is desired, or whose political conduct has been objectionable, does not often recover.