The arms and head are often thrown about also in every direction; and all this time the roaring is kept up with the utmost possible vigor; the continued stamping makes a cloud of dust ascend, and they leave a deep ring in the ground where they stood.

If the scene were witnessed in a lunatic asylum it would be nothing out of the way, and quite appropriate even, as a means of letting off the excessive excitement of the brain; but here gray-headed men joined in the performance with as much zest as others whose youth might be an excuse for making the perspiration stream off their bodies with the exertion.
Motibe asked what I thought of the Makololo dance.

I replied, "It is very hard work, and brings but small profit." "It is," replied he, "but it is very nice, and Sekeletu will give us an ox for dancing for him." He usually does slaughter an ox for the dancers when the work is over.
The women stand by, clapping their hands, and occasionally one advances into the circle, composed of a hundred men, makes a few movements, and then retires.

As I never tried it, and am unable to enter into the spirit of the thing, I can not recommend the Makololo polka to the dancing world, but I have the authority of no less a person than Motibe, Sekeletu's father-in-law, for saying "it is very nice." They often asked if white people ever danced.

I thought of the disease called St.Vitus's dance, but could not say that all our dancers were affected by it, and gave an answer which, I ought to be ashamed to own, did not raise some of our young countrywomen in the estimation of the Makololo.
As Sekeletu had been waiting for me at his mother's, we left the town as soon as I arrived, and proceeded down the river.