Although honey is much prized by Kaffirs, they exercise much caution in eating it; and before they will trust themselves to taste it, they inspect the neighborhood, with the purpose of seeing whether certain poisonous plants grow in the vicinity, as in that case the honey is sure to be deleterious. The euphorbia is one of these poisonous plants, and belongs to a large order, which is represented in England by certain small plants known by the common denomination of spurge. One of them, commonly called milky-weed, sun-spurge, or wort-spurge, is well known for the white juice which pours plentifully from the wounded stem, and which is used in some places as a means of destroying warts. In our own country the juice is only remarkable for its milky appearance and its hot acrid taste, which abides in the mouth for a wonderfully long time; but in Africa the euphorbias grow to the dimensions of trees, and the juice is used in many parts of that continent as a poison for arrows. Some of them look so like the cactus group that they might be mistaken for those plants; but they are easily known by the milky juice that pours from them when wounded, and by the fact that their thorns, when they have any, grow singly, and not in clusters, like those of the cactus. The white juice furnishes, when evaporated, a highly poisonous drug, called euphorbium. [Illustration: (1.) HARP. (See page 211.)] [Illustration: (2.) EXTERIOR OF KAFFIR HUT. (See page 56.)] [Illustration: (3.) 1, SPOON. 2, LADLE. 3, 4, SKIMMERS. (See page 149.)] [Illustration: (4.) WATER PIPE. (See page 164.)] [Illustration: (5.) FOWL HOUSE. (See page 157.)] Honey is often found in very singular places. A swarm has been known to take possession of a human skull, and combs have been discovered in the skeleton framework of a dead elephant. Like many other nations, the Zulus use both poultry and their eggs for food, and both are employed as objects of barter. The unfortunate fowls that are selected for this purpose must be singularly uncomfortable; for they are always tied in bundles of three, their legs being firmly bound together. While the bargaining is in progress, the fowls are thrown heedlessly on the ground, where they keep up a continual cackling, as if complaining of their hard treatment. The Kaffir does not intend to be cruel to the poor birds; but he has really no idea that he is indicting pain on them, and will carry them for miles by the legs, their heads hanging down, and their legs cut by the cords. An illustration on page 155 represents one of the ingenious houses which the Kaffirs build for their poultry. The house is made of rough basket-work, and is then plastered thickly with clay, just like the low walls of the cooking-house mentioned on page 139. By the side of the henhouse is an earthenware jar, with an inverted basket by way of cover. This jar holds corn, and in front of it is one of the primitive grain mills. A beer bowl and its ladle are placed near the mill.