In this respect Fijian witchcraft was immeasurably superior to that of other primitive races who employ similar methods. The Gold Coast tribes slay men by spells of roots tied together with a curse;[65] the priest-king Laibou of the Wa-Nandi tried to annihilate the Uganda force sent against him by leaving a snake tied to a dog near their camp.[66] The Swahili bury medicine at the door of the hut by which the doomed person must pass.[67] But in none of these cases are the excreta of the victim necessary, nor does the superstition react in the interest of public health. Kinda and Yalovaki Not less important in the native polity were the wizard's services in the detection of crime. This was a special branch of the black art, and the _ndaukinda_ seldom engaged in the deadly business of _ndraunikau_. When property was stolen the owner took a present to the seer, and told the story of his loss. The seer, bidding the man pronounce the names of those whom he suspected, fell into deep abstraction, and presently checked the man at a certain name, announcing that an itching in his side or this finger or toe proved the person named to be the thief. If the seer was a member of the tribe he would dispense with the names, and would begin to twitch convulsively and himself pronounce the thief's name. If he was lucky enough to hit upon the right man--and an intimate knowledge of the characters and relations of his fellow-tribesmen often enabled him to do so--the offender would confess at once, for to brazen out a theft against the evidence of a seer's little finger demanded an effrontery that no Fijian could boast. The proper course for a person wrongfully accused by a seer was shown in the case of Mbuli Yasawa, who in 1885 was charged with embezzling the district funds. It appeared that the funds in question were intact, but that, through an error in book-keeping, the scribe had led the people to believe that a considerable sum had been abstracted. Persons were deputed to consult a noted seer, called Ndrau-ni-ivi, whose finger tingled at the mention of the Mbuli's name. The poor Mbuli, knowing for the best of reasons that he was innocent, instead of taking the obvious course of submitting his books to be audited by the magistrate, presented a larger fee to a rival seer to "press down" (_mbika_) that given to Ndrau-ni-ivi, and triumphantly vindicated his character by the verdict of his practitioner's great toe. Upon this evidence he prosecuted his slanderers for defamation before the Provincial Court. The cunning and knack of clever guessing necessary for the lucrative calling of the seer formerly made the business a monopoly of the priests.