"Look here, Numjala," I said reprovingly, "a man of your intelligence ought to be ashamed of even pretending to believe such a thing. Why this is worse than what you told me about the grass not growing at the spot where Ncapayi and his men were killed by the Pondos."
"Is it?"
(Ncapayi, Great Chief of the Baca tribe, with many hundreds of his followers, was killed in 1845 in a battle fought with the Pondos on the Northern bank of the Umzimvubo river, between what is now Mount Frere and the sea.)
"Yes, and nearly as bad as your account of the snow falling on Tshaka's impi and killing hundreds of his soldiers, whilst it fell nowhere else in the neighbourhood."
"Why should not that be true?"
Fearing that it would be useless to attempt demonstrating to Numjala that, logically, no one is bound to prove a negative, I evaded his question, and said:
"You told me the other day that you believed in witchcraft. Surely you did not mean that?"
"Why not? Did not your great Prophet—every one of whose sayings all you white people believe so thoroughly and follow so carefully"—it will be seen that Numjala can be sarcastic—"believe in evil spirits, and even drive them forth? Is it not this that the witch-doctor claims to do? Did not the Prophet of the Wesleyans believe in witchcraft? Now, if you believe the words of your Prophets about some things, why not about others?"
I was surprised at these words, knowing Numjala to be a heathen, and I suppose I must have shown this, for he added:
"I have talked with the missionaries, or rather they have talked to me. Besides, my brother's son is an evangelist, and he has told me a lot about what is taught in the schools."