This Is The Common Mode Of Executing Criminals.
They Are Not Allowed To Speak; Though On One Occasion A Man, Feeling His Wrist
Held Too Tightly, Said, "Hold Me Gently, Can't You?
You will soon be led out
in the same way yourselves." Mpepe's men fled to the Barotse,
and, it being unadvisable for us to go thither during the commotion
which followed on Mpepe's death, we returned to Linyanti.
The foregoing may be considered as a characteristic specimen
of their mode of dealing with grave political offenses. In common cases
there is a greater show of deliberation. The complainant asks the man
against whom he means to lodge his complaint to come with him to the chief.
This is never refused. When both are in the kotla, the complainant
stands up and states the whole case before the chief and the people
usually assembled there. He stands a few seconds after he has done this,
to recollect if he has forgotten any thing. The witnesses to whom
he has referred then rise up and tell all they themselves have seen or heard,
but not any thing that they have heard from others. The defendant,
after allowing some minutes to elapse so that he may not interrupt
any of the opposite party, slowly rises, folds his cloak around him,
and, in the most quiet, deliberate way he can assume -
yawning, blowing his nose, etc. - begins to explain the affair,
denying the charge, or admitting it, as the case may be.
Sometimes, when galled by his remarks, the complainant utters
a sentence of dissent; the accused turns quietly to him, and says,
"Be silent:
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