The whole cares of domestic life fall upon the married woman. Beside doing all the ordinary work of the house, including the building of it, she has to prepare all the food and keep the hungry men supplied. She cannot go to a shop and buy bread. She has to till the ground, to sow the grain, to watch it, to reap it, to thrash it, to grind it, and to bake it. Her husband may perhaps condescend to bring home game that he has killed, though he will not burden himself longer than he can help. But the cooking falls to the woman’s share, and she has not only to stew the meat, but to make the pots in which it is prepared. After a hard day’s labor out of doors, she cannot go home and rest, but is obliged to grind the maize or millet, a work of very great labor, on account of the primitive machinery which is employed--simply one stone upon another, the upper stone being rocked backward and forward with a motion like that of a chemist’s pestle. The Kaffirs never keep flour ready ground, so that this heavy task has to be performed regularly every day. When she has ground the corn she has either to bake it into cakes, or boil it into porridge, and then has the gratification of seeing the men eat it. She also has to make the beer which is so popular among the Kaffirs, but has very little chance of drinking the product of her own industry. It will be seen, therefore, that the work of a Kaffir wife is about twice as hard as that of an English farm laborer, and that therefore she is rather glad than otherwise when her husband takes another wife, who may divide her labors. Moreover, the first wife has always a sort of preëminence over the others, and retains it unless she forfeits the favor of her husband by some peculiarly flagrant act, in which case she is deposed, and another wife raised to the vacant honor. When such an event takes place, the husband selects any of his wives that he happens to like best, without any regard for seniority, and, as a natural consequence, the youngest has the best chance of becoming the chief wife, thus causing much jealousy among them. Did all the wives live in the same house with their husband, the bickerings would be constant; but, according to Kaffir law, each wife has her own hut, that belonging to the principal wife being on the right hand of the chief’s house.