the signification of the word, would lead to the inference that in bygone times they had rendered homage to some presumed divinity either visible or invisible. Another word, closely allied to Morimo, and not unfrequently heard in the vocabulary of the Bechuanas, is “Barimo,” by which they appear to signify the spirits of the departed. But although they cannot be said to have any actual religion, the mass of the population put a kind of faith in certain ceremonies, which amongst other people professing polytheism would be regarded as religious rites; they likewise avow a degree of veneration for certain animals, inasmuch as they will not kill them, eat them, nor use their skins. We find also that ceremonies such as these to which I refer are performed and inculcated by persons educated and set apart for the purpose, with the king, or if the king should be a Christian, with the heathen next in rank to him, at their head; thus forming a sort of society of priests, having a high priest, called nyaka or nyaga.
As long as the Bechuanas, though subdivided into several families, were united under a single sceptre, the right of kingship was hereditary in the Baharutse tribe; and subsequently the old royal family retained the prerogative of performing what might be called the sacerdotal part in the ceremonials. For a long while after the empire was broken up, and the various tribes had branched off—one to the north, others to the south, east, south-east, and south-west, forming larger or smaller independent
