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 returned to Sechele, who received him with unvarying courtesy and kindness. All this happened in 1859, consequently before the attack of the Matabele that I have described.

It may be interesting to know that although Matsheng was universally regarded as Sekhomo’s step-brother, he was not really the son of his father Khari; he was the son of the acknowledged queen, but he was not born until some years after Khari’s death; the rank, however, of the first-born and legitimate son was conceded to him, whilst Sekhomo, a son by a wife of the second grade, though older in years, was reckoned as illegitimate.

It was in 1864 that Sekhomo frustrated Sechele’s attack upon Shoshong. In the following year, when the “boguera” was being celebrated, and Sekhomo observed that neither of his two sons was taking part in the ceremonial, he was so angry that he caused them to be “enchanted” by the molois for a whole year, a proceeding on his part that had no other effect than enlisting the sympathies of the younger regiments on their behalf. His rage reached its height when Khame, who had married Churuku’s daughter, not only refused for himself, but prohibited his wife from taking any share in the rites of the boguera, a time-honoured institution which Sekhomo positively insisted on as indispensable for any one aspiring to be acknowledged as a future queen. He would have liked to procure the assassination of Churuku, but he dared not seek his assassins amongst the Bamangwatos, nor could