Although the bellows which a Kaffir makes are sufficiently powerful to enable him to melt brass, and to forge iron into various shapes, they do not seem to give a sufficiently strong and continuous blast to enable him to weld iron together. Mr. Moffatt mentions a curious anecdote, which illustrates this point. He was visiting Moselekatse, the king of the northern division of the Zulu tribes, and very much frightened the savage monarch by the sight of the wagon, the wheels of which seemed to his ignorant mind to be endowed with motion by some magic power. His greatest wonder was, however, excited by the tire of the wheel, as he could not comprehend how such a piece of iron could be made without the junction of the ends being visible. A native who had accompanied Mr. Moffatt explained to the king how the mystery was solved. He took the missionary’s right hand in his own, held it up before the king, and said, “My eyes saw that very hand cut those bars of iron, take a piece off one end, and then join them as you see now.” After a careful inspection, the spot where the iron had been welded was pointed out. The king then wanted to know whether medicine were given to the iron in order to endow it with such wonderful powers, but was told that nothing was used except fire, a chisel, and a hammer. Yet Moselekatse was king of the essentially warlike Zulus, a nation which possessed plenty of blacksmiths who were well versed in their art, and could forge the leaf shaped blades of the assagais with such skill that the best European smiths could not produce weapons more perfectly suited for the object which they were intended to fulfil. Le Vaillant narrates an amusing instance of the astonishment caused to some Kaffir blacksmiths by a rude kind of bellows which he made after the European fashion. After paying a just tribute of admiration to the admirable work produced by the dusky blacksmiths in spite of their extremely rude and imperfect tools, he proceeds to describe the form of bellows that they used, which is just that which has been already mentioned. “I had great difficulty in making them comprehend how much superior the bellows of our forges in Europe were to their invention; and being persuaded that the little they might catch of my explanation would soon escape from their memories, and would consequently be of no real advantage to them, I resolved to add example to precept, and to operate myself in their presence. [Illustration: (1.) BRIDEGROOM ON APPROVAL. (See page 79.)] [Illustration: (2.) KAFFIR AT HIS FORGE. (See page 96.)]