It frequently happens that a man takes a wife according to native marriage without paying for her, and afterwards, if he desires to retain her or her children, he pays the father for her. A native in the vicinity of Matopo had, in this manner, taken five wives, at various times, without paying for any of them. When some of his children became of an age that his wives' parents desired to take them, he took steps to secure them by paying for his wives. One, however, whom he did not like, he drove away without paying for her. These things show that the marriage vow is exceedingly loose and leads to much immorality. Several years after we came to Matopo Hills a law was passed by the British Government, allowing the girls some freedom of choice in regard to the marriage question, and it is now possible for Christian girls to choose Christian husbands. A man will have a hut for himself and one for each of his wives, and the more wives he has, the greater his importance in the community. I think that it is safe to say that an old heathen's ambition is to have many wives, each with her hut, about him, many sons, who too, with their wives, add to the number of huts, and many daughters, that he may sell them for cattle or sheep and thus increase his flocks and herds. He also likes to have nephews, younger brothers, and other relatives with their wives come to him and swell the number of huts. This makes a large number of huts, large herds, and he becomes an important headman; or if his followers increase sufficiently he may become a chief. These huts, built near together and often enclosed with a fence, are what constitute a kraal. This is a Dutch word and applies only to native villages, but there may be only three or four huts and it still be called a kraal. Their huts are built of poles and mud, much as described in the making of our own, except that the huts of the raw natives are much lower, without windows and with a doorway only about three feet in height. Sometimes no poles are used in the construction of the walls, but they are moulded of earth from the bottom up and are well made. The floor is made of ant-hill earth, well pounded. This is then covered with a thin coat of black earth and polished with stones until it looks not unlike a nicely-polished wooden floor. The Matabele build much better huts than some of the subject tribes; these latter are good farmers, but often have most miserable-looking huts. [Illustration: Matabele Kraal near Matopo Mission.]