There is another cause for this heedless enjoyment of the present moment; namely, an instinctive fatalism, arising from the peculiar nature of their government. The power of life and death with which the Kaffir rulers are invested is exercised in so arbitrary and reckless a manner, that no Kaffir feels the least security for his life. He knows perfectly well that the king may require his life at any moment, and he therefore never troubles himself about a future which may have no existence for him. Of course these traits of character belong only to the Kaffir in their normal condition; for, when these splendid savages have placed themselves under the protection of Europeans, the newly-felt security of life produces its natural results, and they will display forethought which would do no discredit to a white man. A lad, for example, will give faithful service for a year, in order to obtain a cow at the end of that time. Had he been engaged while under the rule of his own king, he would have insisted on prepayment, and would have honorably fulfilled his task provided that the king did not have him executed. Their fatalism is, in fact, owing to the peculiarly logical turn of a Kaffir’s mind, and his determination to follow an argument to its conclusion. He accepts the acknowledged fact that his life is at the mercy of the king’s caprice, and draws therefrom the inevitable conclusion that he can calculate on nothing beyond the present moment. The lofty and thoughtful forehead of the Kaffir does not belie his character, for, of all savage races, the Kaffir is perhaps the most intellectual. In acts he is honorable and straightforward, and, with one whom he can trust, his words will agree with his actions. But he delights in controversy, and has a special faculty for the Socratic mode of argument; namely, by asking a series of apparently unimportant questions, gradually hemming in his adversary, and forcing him to pronounce his own sentence of condemnation. If he suspects another of having committed a crime, and examines the supposed culprit before a council, he will not accuse him directly of the crime, but will cross-examine him with a skill worthy of any European lawyer, each question being only capable of being answered in one manner, and so eliciting successive admissions, each of which forms a step in the argument. An amusing example of this style of argument is given by Fleming. Some Kaffirs had been detected in eating an ox, and the owner brought them before a council, demanding payment for the ox. Their defence was that they had not killed the animal, but had found it dying from a wound inflicted by another ox, and so had considered it as fair spoil. When their defence had been completed, an old Kaffir began to examine the previous speaker, and, as usual, commenced by a question apparently wide of the subject. Q. “Does an ox tail grow up, down, or sideways?” A. “Downward.” Q. “Do its horns grow up, down, or sideways?” A. “Up.”