which they had come the second time. I also went with Westbeech to pay my respects to the newly-arrived queens, most of whom he had already seen in the Barotse valley. Amongst them was the chief wife, Mokena, or “mother of the country.” Altogether I made acquaintance with sixteen of the wives. Sepopo’s favourite was a Makololo named Lunga. The third wife was Marishwati, the mother of Kaika, already nominated as the future heiress to the throne. The fourth wife was named Makaloe; the fifth, Uesi; the sixth, Liapaleng; then came Makkapelo, on whose account two men were put to death in 1874; next in order were Mantaralucha, Manatwa, Sybamba, and Kacindo. The twelfth was called Molechy; this wife, as well as another named Sitan, had been all but drowned by Sepopo for faithlessness.
A seducer of any of the royal wives is at once handed over to the executioner’s assistants, with the instruction that he is “to be sent to fetch buffalo-meat for the king,” meaning that he is to be taken to the woods, and there assegaied. The mode of dealing with an adulterous wife may be illustrated by Sepopo’s proceedings with Sitan. He ordered a number of canoes full of people to push off into the middle of the stream, taking his place in one of them with the culprit. He then had her bound hand and foot, and ducked under the water repeatedly until she became insensible; on her recovering consciousness, he asked her to tell the people how she liked being drowned, and warned her that if ever her offence should be repeated, he should simply put her under water, and leave her there.
