Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review Volumes 32 and 33.djvu/532

 2 22 A Recent Tivin -Murder in S. Africa.

■of the death of the twins. It is not true my mother told her of the death of the children. I did not tell her because the deed had been done by the old women according to the custom. I did not report the matter to anyone myself. By the President.

I do not know when I was born. I do not remember the Boer War. I was born one year after that war. Case for the defence closed.

Mr. Minchin addresses the Court for the prosecution. Mr. Rice for the defence. Judgment.

Banyatsan : Not Guilty. Chelelo : Guilty. Sentence.

Chelelo : Death,

(Signed) J. C. Macgregor,

Resident Commissioner, President of the Court.

(Signed) M. Williams,

Resident Magistrate.

(Signed) R. Reilly,

Acting Resident Magistrate.

The sentence was commuted by H.R.H. the High Com- missioner to imprisonment with hard labour for five years.

The foregoing trial contains much that is of the highest importance for the student of primitive law and practice. It should be compared with the Matabele trial which I have reported in Boanerges. Both of these trials occur amongst Bantu people : but the custom of twin-murder is almost proved to be universal. It is still possible to detect the aboriginal terror which caused, in ancient days, the extermination of the clan in which the monstrosity has appeared. The father, they say, and all the relatives will die. It is tribal law, too, as may be seen from the prominent part which the wife of the headman of the village takes in the proceedings. There is some sus- picion of superposed strata of custom in the evidence. What