two fowls), and the novice repairs to an enclosure outside of the town. He is given a drug which stupefies him, and when he comes to himself he finds his fellow Nkimbas wearing a crinoline of palm frondlets, their bodies whitened with pipeclay, and speaking a mysterious language. Only males are initiated into this rite, which is more like our own Freemasonry. Living apart for a period, varying from six month to two years, he acquires the mysterious language, and at the end of his time he is reckoned a full brother, Mbwamvu anjata, and all Nkimbas in all districts hail him as a brother, help him in his business, give him hospitality, conversing freely with him in the mystic language. It is no gibberish, as that attempted by the Ndembo folk, but until quite lately no white man could get any collection of words. I have, however, been able to get over two hundred words and forty sentences; and while still unable to understand thoroughly the principles on which it has been made up, it is evident that it has been made. The vocabulary is limited, and is characterised by the system of alliteral concord. Some words are slight changes of ordinary Congo, and others bear no resemblance.
The common people are given to understand that the Nkimba know how to catch witches. In the daytime they wander in the grass, and dig for roots, and gather nuts in the woods, often beating people on the roads who do not run away on their approach. At night they rush about screaming and yelling and uttering their wild trill. Woe to the unfortunate man who ventures out of his house in the night for any purpose, a beating and heavy fine will surely follow.
There is no other nonsense to add to the mystery and fear, but the whole raison d’être is the establishment of this fraternity or guild, for mutual help and protection; and the period of separation is for the acquirement of the useful mystic language. Ndembo is an unmitigated abomination; Nkimba is comparatively harmless and useful. It is making its way in from the coast, and may be found interiorwards on the south bank for one hundred and seventy-five miles.