front of Khame’s house. Awakened by the gleam of a fire just beyond his enclosure, Khame crept out and stood quietly surveying the preparations. One of the performers of the mysteries happening to look round, and catching the sight of Khame’s face in the glare, gave a loud cry of surprise; this so startled his companions that they took to their heels. The young man came forward, smashed up all the magic apparatus, threw it as so much lumber on the fire, which he stopped carefully to extinguish, and the next morning, to the chagrin of the king and the discomfiture of the moloi, made his appearance in the kotla as well and hearty as ever.
In conformity with the rest of their character, the moloi have a singular antipathy to rain; they claim the ability to ward it off by burning a fresh green bough, with a suitable incantation, and maintain that they can frighten away the clouds by the mystic use of their guns. In every possible way they lay themselves out to thwart the proceedings of the recognized rain-doctors.
Perhaps the avocation of the linyakas and their chief representative which is really the most important, is the invocation of rain. In protracted periods of drought, when there seems a probability of the accustomed public incantations turning out a failure, recourse is had to linyakas who reside in more rainy districts, the Malokwanas, from the right bank of the central Limpopo, being always ready to put in an appearance in consideration of an adequate present of cattle.
