LABYRINTHS AND WAR GAME
The Zulus are very fond of drawing mazes (usogexe) on the ground with the finger, or—after smoking hemp (insangu)—with saliva passed through a hollow stem of tambootie grass and so made to trace a labyrinth (tshuma sogexe) on a smooth floor. The one who draws generally asks some one else to find the way into the royal hut. And this he does with a pointer of tambootie, or failing to follow the right course and getting cornered, is greeted with a general shout of “Wapuka sogexe!” (you are done for in the labyrinth), and has to go back to the start and begin the quest again. This game is a great favourite, and is often played for hours at a time: the sons of Mpande were great adepts at it. They would vary it sometimes by dotting rows of warriors on the outside, and then success depended on the positions that the combatants were made to assume, the great triumph being to bring an army into the shape of a bull’s head and horns, when he whose horn first touched the adversary’s line was acclaimed as winner.
The above is a copy of a Labyrinth made by a Zulu, Ulutyetye, for the well-known missionary, the Rev. R. Robertson, and first reproduced by Messrs. John Sanderson and Co., of Durban. It is noticeable for having two huts to be reached—that in the centre being the Royal one.
The Church Printing Company
Burleigh Street, Strand, W. C.
