left the town? No, he would not. An unexpected interruption in the
performance of such an act he would regard as a sign that the act would
be attended by misfortune to himself, and he would not repeat it. And
that particular act, if he had repeated it, would certainly have been
attended by misfortune; inflicted not by any invisible power, but by
a white man. For, having undertaken to prevent the wrong, if I should
afterwards allow it, I would lose influence and be despised in that town.
But lest the reader should think of me as a very warlike individual, with
a Bible in one hand and a big stick in the other, I hasten to say that,
except in self-defense, I have only three times, in more than twice so
many years, laid violent hands upon a native; and all three times the
outrageous treatment of a woman was the occasion.
Less dowry is paid for a child than for “a whole woman,” as the Fang
would say. A man frequently pays the dowry for a very young girl, who
is then taken to his town and given in charge to his mother to raise,
and the mother will probably “raise” her very early in the morning. She
trains the girl for her son, and at a proper age delivers his wife to
him. Children are often betrothed to each other, the boy’s father paying
the dowry to the girl’s father, the children of course having nothing
to say in the matter. I am inclined to think that these latter are the
happiest marriages in Africa. A man once came to Efulen in great distress
saying that his little daughter, a mere baby, was very ill and that if
we did not help her she would surely die and, he added, the worst of it
was that she was betrothed and he had received a portion of the dowry
which he would be obliged to return if she should die. His grief was
truly pitiable. I have known instances where a child was betrothed before
it was born, the dowry to be kept intact and returned in case the child
should not be a girl.
One Sunday I walked to an inland town two hours behind Baraka, where I
found the people engaged in talking a dowry-palaver. I had to wait until
this was finished before I could get a hearing. The occasion of the
palaver was briefly this: Some years ago, in another town, there were two
brothers whose father died leaving them their sister as an inheritance.
A husband was found for this sister who paid a handsome dowry. The elder
brother appropriated the dowry and took to himself a wife. Several years
passed; the younger brother was grown to manhood, and he too desired a
wife but had no dowry with which to procure her. He demanded from his
brother his rightful share of his sister’s dowry. The dowry of course was
gone; but the elder brother now had a daughter five years old, and it was
proposed that he should find a husband for this child, thus procuring a
dowry with which to settle with his younger brother. The trouble between
the brothers became serious; and the people, wishing to avoid war,
induced them to ask a certain neighbouring chief, who had a reputation
for wisdom and diplomacy, to arbitrate between them and decide the matter.
This was the palaver that was in progress when I entered the town on
Sunday, and I heard the closing speeches and the decision of the judge,
which was as follows: “I will cut the palaver thus: The elder brother
must dispose of his daughter as speedily as possible, and pay to his
younger brother the sum of the dowry. Meanwhile, to procure obedience to
this, the elder brother’s wife will remain in this town as my wife until
the dowry is paid.”
This amicable arrangement was agreed to by all the parties concerned.
This chief deserved his reputation for cleverness. A few weeks later I
was passing through his town when he called after me and asked if I were
going to pass by without making him a little present of some tobacco in
recognition of our intimate friendship.
In reply I asked: “Why do you not rather complain that I pass your town
without stopping to tell you God’s Word? Is tobacco more important?”
His sprightly answer, delivered with perfect simplicity, was, “No doubt
God’s Word is more important; but tobacco also is God’s gift, and I am
very grateful to Him for it.”
Some of their immoral customs one can only mention with reserve even in
writing. It is always regarded as amiable, and is sometimes required,
that a host should give his wife to a guest. The wife is not consulted.
Yet, if the guest, being a Christian, should refuse to comply with this
custom, the woman, regarding herself as repulsed, will become enraged and
vow vengeance upon the visitor; it will be positively dangerous for him
to eat food in that town lest she poison him. It is common also for a
man afflicted with a long illness to ask a friend to assume his marital
relations until his recovery.
In one instance this request was made of a Christian man by an intimate
friend, and at the woman’s suggestion. The man in his distress appealed
to me to talk the palaver with the sick man. If a man has many wives, it
is regarded as magnanimous for him to take but little notice of social
wrong-doing; and the result is boundless immorality.
Charges of adultery are often made for the purpose of extortion. For this
same purpose husbands and wives together often conspire against another
person.
Polygamy is the greatest obstacle to the introduction of Christianity. It
is not identical with the question of African sensuality; but involves
a man’s wealth, influence and reputation, all of which depend upon the
number of his wives. It is the very foundation of the whole structure of
African society and is as firmly rooted as their Cameroon Mountain in the
African soil. Critics of missions say that the obstacle is insuperable.
But we believe in a Power that can say to the mountain: “Be thou removed;
and be thou cast into the sea.” And that same Power is actually removing
polygamy to-day. Moreover, the critics do not seem to see or do not
understand that if polygamy be an insuperable obstacle to Christianity it
is also an insuperable obstacle to civilization, which they advocate.
The renouncing of polygamy and putting away his wives with all the loss
that it involves serves as a final test of the African’s sincerity in
professing the Christian faith. The man of the parable said: “I have
married a wife, and therefore I cannot come.” When at the close of a
service in a native town I gave a similar invitation a man replied with
a sorrowful shake of his head: “I have married _five_ wives, and cannot
come.”
In the later chapters of this book I shall tell of men who,
notwithstanding the jeers and contempt of the people, have put away many
wives and have come.
Among the real negro tribes of the Soudan (for the tribes of Central
and Southern Africa are not pure negroes) there is a central government
and a general organization. But there is no tribal organization among
the Fang or any other tribe south of the Calabar River. The village,
or a group of villages close together and immediately related, is the
unit and the entirety of organization; although a common language is a
bond of sympathy and they might freely unite against a common foe. Their
government is nearly patriarchal in form. There is a headman in each
village who is usually advanced in years. But unless he has many more
wives than any other man he takes counsel in all matters with the elders
of the town; and there are many public discussions in which all the men
have a right to advise. There is no despotism, except the despotism of
custom which no chief would challenge.
The right hand of the government is a secret society of the men, usually
called _The Gorilla Society_, or sometimes _The Leopard Society_. This
or some corresponding society is found in all the tribes of West Africa,
though there are details of difference even between the communities of
the same tribe. The head of the society is not supposed to be a man, but
a gorilla. They all know that this is not true but they have agreed to
impose this lie upon each other and no one would dare say that the head
of the society is a man. This man, or gorilla, is a witch-doctor and has
great knowledge of witchcraft and all the occult arts. When a person dies
the gorilla can tell whether he has been a victim of witchcraft, and he
has means of discovering the witch. In order to realize the power of this
man and the society one need only remember that nearly every death in
Africa is imputed to witchcraft. His knowledge, however, is not regarded
as absolute. He designates certain persons whom he professes to see in a
vision, and they are then tried by ordeal.
It would be impossible to exaggerate the African terror of witchcraft.
When it is announced that a certain deceased person has died of
witchcraft, a panic ensues. They run back and forth in the street with
wild, staring eyes, uttering imprecations and demanding blood.
The common ordeal is to drink some poisonous concoction and if it does
not produce vertigo the accused is adjudged innocent; but if he staggers
or falls he is guilty, and the people, all standing around and looking on
with spears and swords in their hands, immediately rush upon him and kill
him, usually cutting the body to pieces. Far more women than men die this
death.
Among the Fang this society represents the worship of ancestors. The
motive of the worship is not devotion to their ancestors but rather
that they may procure their help in every undertaking, good and bad.
Each man as directed by the head of the society secures the skull of a
father or uncle recently deceased and after various ceremonies, of which
I shall speak when I describe the native religion, he puts the skull in
a box made for the purpose. No woman may see the contents of the box,
nor is she supposed to know what it contains. If she should see the
skull she will die. And she really does die, if it be known that she
has seen it. She is doubtless poisoned by the society. The spirit of
the ancestor, if the skull is well treated, will punish with sickness
or death a disobedient or false wife, or any other enemy. This it is
supposed will in some degree restrain disobedience on the part of wives
and secure justice and honesty between men. Thus it serves the purpose
of government. Where the power of the ancestor is the efficient agent
rather than the supernatural power of the head of the society, the latter
has less prominence and often does not profess to be more than a man.
But where he is regarded as a gorilla, or spirit, no woman or child or
uninitiated man may see him and live. Therefore as he approaches a town
he gives warning by roaring like a gorilla. The women and children flee
for their lives. Or, if unable to escape, they fall upon the ground and
shut their eyes, mothers also putting their hands over their babies’
eyes, until the gorilla passes out of the town, after having helped
himself to chickens, bananas or anything that he desires.
The African, it is said, loves idleness, amusement and war; of these
three he probably loves war most.
Except in the vicinity of the foreign governments or the missions, war is
the usual condition; not only between tribe and tribe but between village
and village. Beyond the range of civilization there is no salutation
between persons casually meeting and no need of it; a man hearing another
approaching in the forest would hide.
_Nsama_, which means a crowd, is also the word for chance, or
opportunity; because a man does not go anywhere alone and a crowd is his
opportunity. Of course villages are often on friendly terms and some may
manage to remain so; but in such cases there are usually strong reasons
of expediency.
The usual beginning of a war is the stealing of a woman, as I have said;
but this does not always lead to war and the shedding of blood. Nearer
the coast milder measures of retaliation are often preferred, and when
a woman is stolen the offended town will capture one of the other side
and keep him prisoner until the woman is returned. The solidarity of the
village in the native mind is impressed upon one continually. They also
capture persons of a village in which some one owes them a dowry which
he is reluctant to pay. In all such matters the whole village is held
responsible for each one of its inhabitants. Many a time, travelling on
the river, I have been about to call at a town when one of my crew in
alarm has told me that there was a palaver between that town and his town
and he dare not enter there. At the next town another one of the crew may
raise the same objection; and another at the next. After a thorough trial
I had to depend almost entirely on men of the coast rather than the Fang,
for at least the first two years. It was not a cowardly imagination on
the part of my Fang crew; they were in real danger.
On one occasion one of my Fang boys, Ndong Koni, my best helper and most
devoted friend, accompanied me to a certain Fang town with which his
people had a palaver. He had not a vestige of fear in him and he told me
nothing about it, but depended upon my presence for his safety. When I
was about to hold a service in the street I observed that the people were
muttering in anger, and at last there was an outburst of wrath which, as
I saw in a moment, was directed against Ndong Koni. A “sister” of Ndong
Koni, who as a matter of fact was not nearer than a second cousin, having
married a man in this town, had recently run away from a brutal husband,
and her people had not yet made her return, or, unwilling to send her
back, had not yet returned the dowry. The proposition was to seize Ndong
Koni and put him in stocks until the palaver should be settled. Once
they should lay hands upon him nothing could be done to restrain them;
for when degraded and ignorant people have committed one hostile act
they become excited and violent; they are then a mob. I hurried to Ndong
Koni’s side and with him I stepped back from the crowd while I addressed
them and presented various arguments.
[Illustration: NDONG KONI.
_The first, the most faithful and the bravest of all my African
friends._]
I said first: “Ndong Koni while in my service does not belong to his
town, but to me; he is my son, and you have no palaver with me. Now
suppose that one of your own young men should work for me—and I see
several fine-looking young men here with strong arms to pull an oar.
Suppose that a young man of your town should go with me to Alum, where
you have a palaver, and that the people of Alum should attempt to seize
him, what would you like to have me do? Shall I say: ‘He is only a black
boy and I am a white man; I don’t care what you do with him.’ Or shall I
say: ‘The colour of the skin makes no difference, so long as the blood
is red. This boy while he works for me is my son; and if you should harm
a white man’s son you will have a palaver with me and with the white
governor at Libreville who owns the gunboat.’ Now what would you like me
to say if one of these young men should go with me to Alum and the people
should want to put him in stocks?”
They shouted in reply: “We would want you to say he was your son. Those
are good words. You are the father of us all.”
“Yes,” said I, “I have many, many children; but my life is full of
trouble, for they do not obey me.”
The chief and a few others were as hostile as ever, but there was a
marked change in the attitude of the people; and in order to force an
assertion of their friendliness I attempted a grand bluff, while I was
inwardly quaking.
Approaching the threatening chief I laid my hand upon his arm and said:
“Come and seize this boy if you dare. Come with me and before my face put
your hand upon my son.”
“No,” cried the people; and they crowded between the chief and Ndong
Koni. The palaver was finished; but I thought it well to pass on to the
next town and not wait to hold a service. Before I got away however they
crowded around me, saying: “Since you are the father of the Fang surely
you ought to give us some tobacco. A father gives tobacco to his sons.”
It is thus frequently in Africa; the serious ends in burlesque; and,
perhaps as frequently, comedy ends in tragedy.
The chief himself, coming forward just before my departure, assured
me of his good will by solemnly taking my hand in his and spitting in
it. I know the theory of some regarding this touching demonstration
of affection,—that the native means only to blow with his breath,
symbolic of imparting a blessing, and that the spitting is incidental,
a “by-product”—so to speak—of the blessing. But as I looked at my hand
I realized that it was not a theory, but a condition, that confronted
me, a condition that called loudly for soap and water—_warm_ water and
plenty of soap. I have before this acknowledged the receipt of blessings
in disguise; but I would cheerfully renounce any possible benefits that
might accrue from a blessing coming in such a disguise as this. And
if the old chief had approached me a second time with the offer of a
blessing on the other hand, I would have said: “Please give me a curse
instead, by way of variety.”
The form of “socialism,” by which any one of a village may be seized and
killed by the enemy for the wrong of any other of that same village, is
even carried further, and to the extent that one person may be given over
to the enemy for the wrong done by another person. I have already said,
in reference to the Bulu, that at the end of a war the ordinary way of
settling the palaver is that the side that has done the most killing will
pay over to the other side a corresponding number of women, who become
wives or sometimes slaves in the enemy’s town.
In war they are not careful to kill only the enemy, but often shoot
recklessly at any one in sight who might possibly belong to the other
side, not waiting to be sure about it. In the dark forest they often
mistake a friend for a foe, with dreadful consequences. On the river it
is not so frequent.
One evening one of my boys, Amvama, who afterwards became a catechist,
an honest and lovable boy, was in a canoe on the river, fishing with a
net. It was evening and he was in the shade of overhanging trees. Several
canoes approached and the people mistaking Amvama fired upon him. He
hastened to the bank and leaving the canoe and net fled into the forest,
while they seized all that he had left. They afterwards learned who it
was that they had so nearly killed. Amvama’s people demanded his canoe
and net, which were surrendered. But the civilized Amvama cared less for
the loss of these things than for the personal outrage done him in their
attempt to kill him. He indignantly put the question: “Why did you fire
upon me?”
They only replied: “How did we know it was you?”
“How did you know it was _not_ I?” responded Amvama. But it is not likely
that the discussion contributed greatly to the science of ethics among
the Fang.
There is a strange war-custom in all the tribes of West Africa unlike
anything that I have known or heard of elsewhere. Often when a woman is
stolen from a small and poorly defended town, the people, desiring to
make a desperate protest, or being unusually resentful and fierce, will
kill some person of a third town that has nothing whatever to do with
the palaver, by way of drawing attention to the fact that a crime has
been committed and of impressing the community with its enormity. But it
seems hard that a man should be punished for a crime without having the
pleasure of committing it. Sometimes, however, this is done to enlist
the help of the third town. For, this third town according to custom is
not supposed to retaliate directly but will unite with the town which
has killed one of their people in wreaking vengeance upon the first
town, which was the original offender and therefore the cause of all the
trouble.
Imagine A, B and C to be three schoolboys; the principle of the custom
then is this (if the colloquial language may be pardoned): A licks B; B,
not being able to lick A, lies in wait for C and licks him; then C joins
with B and they together lick A. The moral beauty of this principle is
evident: A, B and C each get licked.
On one occasion when holding a service in a town we heard two shots fired
in rapid succession in another town close by. Each shot killed a man;
one of them was a chief. They were unarmed and suspecting no harm; for
neither they nor their people had anything to do with the palaver which
was the occasion of the killing; nor had they even heard of it. A man of
the town that I was visiting and who was then sitting in the audience had
just stolen a woman from another town, which latter town was small and
poorly defended. Being desperate, and in order that they might not be a
prey to stronger towns, they resorted to this peculiar mode of justice
that they might form a strong coalition against the enemy. In this they
succeeded and fourteen persons were killed before that palaver was ended.
Among the Mpongwe, in the old days before the foreign power was
established, and among the closely related tribes south of them, this
custom prevailed in an extreme form. A woman being stolen, the people of
the offended town would hurry to another town near by before the news had
reached them and would kill somebody. This town would then hurry to the
next and kill somebody there, each town doing likewise until perhaps five
or six persons of as many different towns would be killed in one night.
The last town would then, with the help of the others, demand justice
from the first. It may be that the object of this frightful custom was to
restrain men from committing the initial crime, that might be attended
with such widespread death, bringing upon themselves the curses of many
people. For above all things the African cannot bear to be disliked and
cannot endure execration.
The chief amusements of the Fang and other tribes of West Africa are
music, dancing and story-telling. In these, and at all times, they
exhibit a strong sense of humour, truly surprising in an uncivilized
people. In this faculty they are next to our own race and quite
unequalled by others. In their survival of suffering and oppression, in
their easy forgetfulness of injury, and their constant buoyancy of mind,
who can tell how much they owe to their keen sense of humour? The pain
of suffering and the weight of heavy burdens are mitigated by frequent
laughter. They are fond of incongruous comparisons. On one occasion when
we were travelling on the river there was on board a white man who was
very bald, and who attracted considerable attention from the crew because
they had never seen a bald white man before. One of their number cheered
up a lot of tired boys by remarking that the head of that white man was
like a fresh-laid egg.
They are passionately fond of music; but their sense of rhythm is far
more keen than their sense of melody. Accordingly the drum in various
forms is the favourite instrument. There are two principal kinds of
drum, both made from the trunk of a tree hollowed out, and about four
feet long. One of these stands upright and the open end is covered with
deerskin. It is beaten with the palms of the hand. They play remarkably
well upon this drum. With great variety in the beat they maintain a
constant and perfect rhythm.
The other drum, which is larger, lies on its side, has closed ends, and
a long narrow opening in the side. It is beaten with two heavy sticks.
The wood of the drum is very resonant and it can be heard at a distance
of many miles. It is used as a kind of telegraph between towns, and
messages are sent upon it. This is done by means of a secret language
of inarticulate sounds which they are able to imitate upon the drum,
according to the part of it which they strike and the regularity of
the stroke. The women do not understand it, except a few common calls.
Neither would any one be allowed to teach it to a white man. This
telegraphic use of the drum is extraordinary; messages of startling
definiteness are sometimes sent ahead of a caravan over a great distance
being repeated in town after town. This drum, therefore, bulky and
unlikely as it appears, is very skillfully made, being precise in form
and with varying shades of thickness in different parts. As to its
musical qualities, it may have charms to soothe the savage breast; I am
very sure that it could soothe no others; and among white people it would
make more savages than it would soothe.