Page:South Africa (1878 Volume 2).djvu/319

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is the usual result of detection. The fine is paid to the injured person. A Chief cannot be prosecuted for theft by one of his own tribe. The children of Chiefs are permitted to steal from people of their own tribe, and no action can be brought against them. Should one be taken in the fact of so stealing and be whipped, or beaten, all the property of the whipper or beater may be confiscated by the Chief. There was a tribe some years ago in which there were so many royal offshoots, that not a garden, not a goat was safe. A general appeal was made to the paramount Chief and he decided that the privilege should in future be confined to his own immediate family.

For wilful injury a man has to pay the full amount of damage; but for accidental injury he pays nothing. This seems to be unlike the general Kafir theory of law. There is no fine for trespass; the idea being that as all lands are necessarily and equally open, the absence of any recovery on account of damage is equal to all. When fencing has become common this idea will probably vanish. If cattle that are trespassing be driven off and injured in the driving, fines can be recovered to the amount of the damage done.

When illness comes a doctor is to be employed. Should death ensue without a doctor a fine is imposed,—which goes to the Chief.

There are many religious rites and ceremonies and many laws as to cleanness and uncleanness; but it would hardly interest the reader were I to describe them at length. At the age of puberty, or what is so considered among the