Nada the Lily by H. Rider Haggard — Read

After this there was quiet until the Feast of the First-fruits was ended. But few people were killed at this feast, though there was a great _Ingomboco_, or witch-hunt, and many were smelt out by the witch-doctors as working magic against the king. Now things had come to this pass in Zululand-that the whole people cowered before the witch-doctors. No man might sleep safe, for none knew but that on the morrow he would be touched by the wand of an _Isanusi_, as we name a finder of witches, and led away to his death. For awhile Chaka said nothing, and so long as the doctors smelt out those only whom he wished to get rid of-and they were many-he was well pleased. But when they began to work for their own ends, and to do those to death whom he did not desire to kill, he grew angry. Yet the custom of the land was that he whom the witch-doctor touched must die, he and all his house; therefore the king was in a cleft stick, for he scarcely dared to save even those whom he loved.

One night I came to doctor him, for he was sick in his mind. On that very day there had been an _Ingomboco_, and five of the bravest captains of the army had been smelt out by the _Abangoma_, the witch-finders, together with many others. All had been destroyed, and men had been sent to kill the wives and children of the dead. Now Chaka was very angry at this slaying, and opened his heart to me.