Note 318.1 — RITUAL AND BELIEF (continued 2)

Light is perhaps thrown on the matter by the final test actually imposed on the successor elected to the throne of Ukerewe, an island in the lake, and therefore adjacent to the kingdom of Karagwe. He is taken to Kitale, the burial-place of the kings, about two kilometres from the capital. There lies an immense stone rising like a donkey’s back from the soil, beginning a few centimetres only above the earth, and gently swelling until it attains the height of a little more than a metre. It is called the ruswa. The provisionally proclaimed king, with both hands laden with lances, bows and arrows, and wearing gigantic native sandals, is required to climb it slowly and with short steps to the top. If he be so unfortunate as to slip and fall on the way, he is unworthy of the drum (the symbol of sovereignty), and is driven away without pity. If, on the other hand, he successfully reach the platform, or highest point of the rock, he is acclaimed in a frenzy of excitement, the men breaking forth into a sham fight, the women joyfully shouting “Yu, yu!” The test is over; he is definitely king.318.1 It is not impossible that, reduced to its final terms, some such ordeal as this was what the candidate for the throne of Karagwe actually underwent.