Deathly Dagga

Lurking among the flowers and vegetables in many a South African garden patch is an innocent-looking weed called dagga. Dried and smoked like marijuana, a close relative, it induces a dreamy recklessness that can spur men to acts of terrible savagery. Nearly one-fourth of the rapes, murders and maulings that occur in the slums of South Africa's great cities are blamed on dagga.

The illicit dagga traffic has been on the rise recently, and local police have long suspected the existence of some great new source of the drug. On patrol of the foothills lying beneath the great, rugged Drakensberg Mountains a fortnight ago, a party of seven policemen discovered one such source--a vast valley planted solidly with the grey-green weed. They sent a messenger to the nearest police station to report their find, then began tearing out the plants one by one. Suddenly from the mountain above there came a fierce Zulu battle cry. Down the hill raced a horde of black savages, maddened with the drug and furiously waving their assagais and knobkerries. Five cops were speared to death. The other two escaped badly battered after a three-hour chase.

By the time reinforcements arrived, the Zulu dagga planters had fled to the impenetrable, distant mountains. Unable to pursue them, police returned to the dagga valley with a fleet of trucks. At week's end they had harvested and destroyed close to 200 tons of deathly dagga.

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