Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 7, 1896.djvu/32

"My name is Namaqa; I come from Wala, but my family properly belong to Talatala, in Vaturu. They left it in heathen times when the Vaturu people were burnt out by the enemy and took refuge in Sabeto; but my father and mother fled over into Vosa and settled at Wala, where we have lived ever since. I have one elder whole brother: his name is * * * My mother is * * * She is my real mother, of whom I was born. We are all affected by leprosy. My father was named Kuruwaqato and he died, a few months ago only, from leprosy at Keiyasi (near Wala) whither he had gone for treatment. His hands were withered and contracted, there were ulcers upon them and blisters; he had lost several phalanges from both fingers and toes, and had maculæ also which were numb and callous to feeling. He was my real father, my mother * * *'s husband: he had no brothers: I have no uncles, and no other leprous relations but my father, mother, and brother. My father was the first of us to show symptoms. It came about as follows. Several years ago we went out, all four of us, one day to attend to our plantations, leaving the house empty. No one at all was in it, not even a child. I myself was only a small boy at that time, but I often accompanied my parents to the food-gardens. When we returned to the house we saw the Sakuka (leprosy) had crossed our threshold. He had put his mark there, he had entered at the end-door and had crawled to the hearth; and we knew that he had been to our house because we saw his handprints and footprints in the ashes of the hearth. They were the prints of mains en griffe, and the feet were clubbed or hooflike and had lost their toes, and all were like the extremities of a leprous person. We spoke about the occurrence amongst ourselves; and we knew that we should develop leprosy as a consequence as we were marked for it by the Sakuka. My father was the first of us to become affected, my mother next, then my elder brother, and myself last.