We manifestly stood on holy ground. Many stones bore signs of

medicine—yams, dabs of palm oil, broken calabashes, and cowries in

strings. Above us rose the ‘logan-stone,’ the remains of an older world,

now washed down into the deep Atlantic. Descending through a dense bush,

where long sharp thorns and the chance of meeting a snake made us ‘look

alive,’ and hopping from boulder to boulder, we presently entered the

mysterious Oro grove: a little further north it would be called a

‘Debbil-bush.’ The Egbas, like the ancient Persians, and most of the

modern pagans, combine a propensity for worshipping in high places with

fondness of the concealment which the shady forest affords. There was

nothing to distinguish the place from a jungle camp—though I have little

doubt that at no great distance we might find a skeleton or two with the

fatal cord still unrotted around its neck. Three dwarf sheds, short

smoke-stained mud walls with roofs of decaying palm-leaf, brown and

bald, a grassy patch broken here and there by boulders and enclosed

within a wall of bush verdure, capped by tall overhanging trees—this was

all that met the eye. To fill in the picture, you must suppose the place

restored and occupied by twenty or thirty ancients, villainous-looking

as Spanish inquisitors in caricature, with countenances expressing the

cold cruelty of the _castrato_ and the bloodthirsty joy with which the

cat plays with her prey; some sitting under the shade drinking pitto,

palm-wine, and fire-water, others standing, staff in hand, chanting,

gesticulating, and dealing out the words of wisdom, with, perhaps, the

material for torture or human sacrifice lying bound on the sward at

their feet. Such was the scene described to me by a gentleman who

unwittingly had passed by the Oro grove when council had met, and who

had bowed to its inmates.

Returning towards Eruwan, I was shown by Mr. Hughes a house from which

he had saved an old man. The building had caught fire by the

carelessness of some women. The people however supposed it to be the

work of Shango—god of thunder and lightning: had no European been there,

or one without the pluck to break through the crowd and to harangue them

with explanations, there would have been an Egba _de moins_. As we

passed the Church Missionary compound there was a ‘pow-wow.’ A circle of

converts, clad in quasi-European toggery, squatted upon the ground, and

in the centre stood the speaker, who threw out his upper limbs and

gesticulated, walking up and down like a Hindu preacher. At first I

thought it was a young ‘camp meeting:’ presently the occasion was

explained to me. The chiefs at the seat of war had sent to the city a

message complaining that the Christians were not nearly so ready to

fight, and _pro patriô mori_, as they had promised, and as they ought to

be. It was a curious contrast to the scenes that had passed during the

day within the walls of the sacred building hard by—tidings of peace and

goodwill to all men delivered in the morning; in the evening, a summons

to kidnap, plunder, and kill. Yet, ταῦτα οὔτως ἔχει, as the Romaic

epitaph pathetically has it.

I now proceed to a short account of the Yoruban mythology as far as it

is known—few of the people are conversant with its details—to books and

to my various informants. Like all these religions, if such they can be

called, there is in it a vagueness and a variety of explanation which,

despite the advantage of alphabets and of a far superior organization,

appears strikingly in the worship of ancient Greece and Rome, and of

modern India. The minor details are never to be trusted; the main points

are better fixed in the public mind—before two days’ residence in the

city you hear of Shango and Oro, and after a week they have become

‘household words.’ The mythology of Yoruba is not far from being as

extensive as that with which Assyria, Egypt, and India overspread the

Indo-European world, and its gods are numerically strong, mustering from

three hundred to four hundred. Like all other similar systems, it is a

syncretism, the deities being collected from the various lands to which

they were peculiar: thus Shiva, the Indian, is a local god, posterior to

Brahma and Vishnu, the other members of the triad; thus Bacchus came

from the banks of the Ganges or the Indus; and thus Osiris was imported

from Egypt into Rome. As I have before said, touching things material,

everywhere we see traces that Africa was once as closely united as

Italy. It is, therefore, difficult to say how much of the Yoruban faith

is original. The Romans penetrated through the northern desert, the Jews

had a powerful kingdom in Abyssinia, the Portuguese missionaries

invested the eastern and the western coasts, and the Moslems have

gradually been hemming in the heathenry. Such influences must have been

strong upon the plastic and conforming mind of the polytheist, but the

measure of their strength is not appreciable.

Long ago Dr. Vanderkemp asserted that the Kafirs of the Cape were ‘pure

atheists,’ without the idea of the existence of a God. Mr. Casalis (p.

238) tells us that the Kafirs ‘had entirely lost the idea of a Creator;’

that ‘it never entered their’ (the Kafirs’) ‘heads that the earth and

sky might be the work of an invisible being;’ and that in their

languages the word for world signified ‘having always been—to exist in

an incomprehensible manner.’ Bishop Colenso ascribes to them a distinct

traditionary belief in the Supreme Being, whom they acknowledge under

the twofold titles of Umkulumkulu—the Great Essence, and

Umvelinquanze—the First Comer Out; but of him and his attributes they

understand nothing, and neither worship nor invoke him.’ Dr.

Livingstone, with his usual peremptory and unsatisfactory way of laying

down the law upon every question, affirms that ‘the existence of a God

and of a future state has always been admitted by all the Bechuanas.’ A

far better authority, Dr. Moffat (‘Missionary Labours,’ p. 245), remarks

concerning the Bachwanas (Bechuanas), whilst owning that they ‘are acute

reasoners and minute observers of men and manners,’ that ‘to tell them,

the greatest of them, that there was a Creator, the Governor of the

heavens and earth—of the fall of man, or the redemption of the world—the

resurrection of the dead, and immortality beyond the grave—is to tell

them what appeared to be more fabulous, extravagant, and ludicrous than

their own vain stories about lions, hyænas, and jackals.’[94] I can

easily understand this. Perhaps the illustrious Humboldt, the greatest

philosopher of our age, sympathized in their touching confession of

ignorance concerning all things beyond man’s actual reach. And it is

undoubted that, by the force of their rationalism, these men, gifted

with the ‘docility of a child, but the reasoning powers of mature age,’

were able to suggest to the Bishop of Natal that his misgivings touching

the historical character of the books attributed to Moses were founded

on fact. The same missionary (p. 257) declares that the Kafirs have no

word in their language expressing the conception of a Deity: he found no

altars, legends, or unknown gods, and his _soi-disant_ converts would

often declare to him that he had taught them the rudimental conception

of a Deity. He believes, like the Jesuits in China—who accounted for

Buddhism, the origin of their faith, as Satan’s caricature of it—that it

was the Devil who erased every vestige of religious impression from the

heathen mind. Setting aside the great fact, that of all unsuccessful

characters in history Sathanas is probably the greatest failure—in other

words that ‘the Devil _is_ an Ass’—I must differ from him in holding

atheism to be the natural condition of the savage and uninstructed mind,

the night of spiritual existence, which disappears before the dawn of a

belief in things unseen. A Creator is to creation what the cause of any

event in life is to its effect: those familiar to the sequence will

hardly credit its absence from the minds of others. And only the brain

supersaturated with its own prejudices and impressions can force itself

into explanations of the seeming mystery by referring it to diabolical

and similar mythical agencies.

The Egbas have progressed more than one step beyond this savage atheism.

With ‘gods many and lords many,’[95] and a considerable mixture of

idolatry, they have a distinct name for a Creator. They call him Olorun,

an abbreviation of O li Orun—lord or owner of the sky or firmament. It

might also be translated Lord of Ghostland; Oki Orun, ‘Hill Ghostland’

being, Anglicised, ‘Heaven,’ opposed to Orun Akpadi, which some

translate ‘Crucible Hades,’ _i.e._, Hell. Thus, the name of the town Bi

Olorun Kpellu, ‘Si Deus nobiscu’ (quis contra nos?). He is also known as

Eleda—the Creator, Olo-Dumare—the Ever-Righteous, Oluwa—the Lord, and

Oga-Ogo—the Glorious High One. These, however, are palpable attributes

of a vague being without personality and without objectivity: at best

the name is used like the Hindu Pariah employs the word

Bhagwan—Deity—whilst he worships some low incarnation which he considers

infinitely inferior in dignity to a live Brahmin. I much doubt, also,

whether the word conveys at all to their minds the Ens Entium, an

existence disseverated from some natural object—sun or sea, rain or

firmament.[96] The use of the name, however, is clear and distinct. The

Egbas say Olorun—not Orishako or Obatala—bless you! Olorun give you

children, farms, cowries! and so forth. Olorun aku!—salutation to

God!—is the highest expression of submission. Essentially simple, the

prayer has nothing to do with the metaphysics of faith—confession of

aboriginal sin, prayer for pardon, or thanksgiving for redemption. They

talk of seeing Olorun after death, and are said not to be without the

idea of a vague and obscure futurity, a continuation in which rewards

and punishments will be distributed. In Orun and its several

modifications it would not be difficult to discover a tripartite kingdom

of the dead, corresponding with the Elysium, the Hades, and the Tartarus

of ancient Europe. Only, as amongst the more polished Greeks and Romans,

the future is held by them to be, from its exceeding uncertainty, and

from the total absence of all judicial proof of its existence, much less

important than the present. As has been remarked, the Egbas have long

dwelt in the presence of a monotheistic people, the Moslems, and of late

years they have had Christians amongst them. But even without these

advantages the ease of an agricultural state, and the existence of a

distinct priestly body, would tend to promote the study of that which

comes, or is made to come, after the material world.

Similarly the East Africans near the Moslems of Zanzibar have their

Mulungu; in the South-east, where the Portuguese are, their Murimo; and

in Kongo, also colonized by Europeans, their Zambi and Nganna Riossu.

Mungo Park also remarks of the negroes bordering upon Moslem Mandeng

that ‘the belief of one God, and of a future state of reward and

punishment, is entire and universal among them.’

To quote the same traveller, ‘The Africans represent the Deity indeed as

the creator and preserver of all things; but, in general, they consider

him a being so remote, and of so exalted a nature, that it is idle to

imagine the feeble supplications of wretched mortals can reverse the

decrees and change the purposes of unerring wisdom.’[97] That the gods

take but little interest, and exercise scant interference in human

affairs, is an idea as old as Confucius and Epicurus—they meddle,

indeed, so little that a future state must be hypothesised in account

for their incuriousness. The Africans, like many other ancient peoples,

seem to think that the Deity has retired from business, and has deputed

his functions to inferior officers. Besides, as much of their religion

is modified by and modelled upon their private life and the ceremonies

of their courts, they hold the courtiers completely distinct from and

somewhat independent of the king. They therefore use the name of, but do

not pray to, Olorun; and holding him so far above and beyond mankind

that he must be addressed through intermediate agencies, they satisfy

the yearnings of their human nature by the adoration of subordinate

beings. Thus the ancient Christians, whilst asserting that latria,

altars, and sacrifice were due to God alone, sanctioned addresses to

saints and martyrs, in order to be assisted by their prayers. Hence the

worship of Orisha or idols.

The word Orisha is derived by some—Europeans will find the root of

everything—from Asha, ‘customs’ or ‘religious ceremonies.’ It is also

called Alaybawi—a mediator or intercessor. The saint system and prayers

to the Virgin are the vestiges of this idea in Christianity; in El Islam

the doctrine of Imams and Walis are fragments of the older creed set,

like the Black Stone which was once white, in the corner of the modern

faith. Of course the symbol is confounded with the thing symbolized; and

the statue or picture, which the enlightened look upon as they would a

portrait or a memento, becomes amongst the vulgar an object of absolute

worship.[98]

There are three principal Orisha, which word, thus used, does not mean

idols, but rather the Di majorum gentium of the Romans, and which appear

to be deified heroes and ancestors. This triad consists of Obatala,

Shango, and Ifa. It does not, like the Hindu Trinity, express a

metaphysical idea of the Demiurgos in his great triune

operations—creating, preserving, destroying; nor does it typify the

family, as the Egyptian Osiris, Isis, and Horus; nor does it deify the

elemental worlds, like the Romans, who personified them by Jupiter,

Neptune, and Pluto. And it will be remarked that for the grace and

beauty of Greek fable these Africans substitute a grotesqueness—the

reflex of their own physical and moral peculiarities. It is to be hoped

that those enthusiasts who declare that ‘le dogme de la Trinité de

Personnes, dans l’Unité de l’Etre, se trouve dans la conscience des

peuples,’ will not find the idea in the Yoruban triad as they have in

the ‘three perpendicular lines of the Egyptians, the Chinese word

equivalent to Jehovah (!), the Tibetan Trabat, the savages of Cuba, the

Tanga-tanga of the Peruvians, the Celtic druids, the Odin, Wilo, and We

of the Scandinavians, and the book of Zohar.’ A past, present, and

future—a creation, preservation, and destruction—are easy mental

sequences, starting up instinctively. Besides, the Indo-European race,

to which the triad-belief belongs—as opposed to Semitic

monotheism—shows, from the most ancient times, the closest connection of

thought and derivation of language.

Obatala is derived from Oba ti nla, the King of Greatness, also called

Orisha Klá, the great Orisha. Others deduce the word from ‘Oba ti álá,’

King of Whiteness or Purity, whence his worshippers always wear white

garments. His other titles are Alamore, ‘owner of the good clay,’ and

Orisha Kpokpo, or Idol of the Gate—a guardian and a Janus. In this view

he is the first and greatest of created things; some, however, believe

him to be an ancient king of Yoruba, and quote the name of his father.

Thus Shodeke, as has been said, is in a fair way of becoming a

demigod.[99] He is sometimes represented as a warrior on horseback,

holding a spear; at other times as an androgyne, which white men

philosophize about as representing the male and female energies of

nature, whose god is Olorun or Eleda, the creator. Obatala’s wife is

Iyangba, or the receiving mother, and is denoted, like Isis and the

Madonna, by a woman nursing a child.[100] His sacred symbol is Okko, a

ship—the vessel, according to the rationalists, in which the Yoruban

people crossed the Niger: it is the Ark of that faith. Obatala created

the first man, Okikishi—so called from Okiki, fame, or Obalofu, the lord

of speech, equivalent to the Adam of the Hebrews; and the first woman

was his wife Iye, or life, from ‘ye,’ to live; in sound and idea

curiously resembling Hawwa or Eve. They came from heaven, an idea also

found in the book of Genesis. No Hebrew or Moslem believes the garden of

Eden to have been upon earth, but in the first or lowest of the Seven

Heavens, which is an exact fac-simile of these sub-lunary scenes;[101]

with them, therefore, the ‘Fall’ of man is literally a fall. Obalofu and

Iye had many children. Their first settlement was at Ife; they then

successively removed to Ikose, Igboho (Lander’s Bohoo), and Oyo or Eyeo.

The second great Orisha is called Shango—he is a well-known god.[102]

This demi-deity—at once Vulcan, Tubal Cain, Thor, and Jupiter Tonans—was

born at Ife, and reigned at Ikoso, a town lately destroyed; others say

that he is a Nupe god. He had a palace of brass, and kept 10,000 horses

in his stables, showing him, by the analogy of Hercules, and Castor and

Pollux, to have been originally a mere mortal. Like certain Hebrew

worthies, he went alive to heaven, where he reigns in state, hunts,

fishes, markets, and wars. The abstract Shango is the grandson of

Aganju, the desert or firmament, a descendant from Okikishi: his father

is Orungan, or midday, and his mother is Yemaya or Ijemoja, ‘mother of

fishes,’ an unimportant river in Yoruba.[103] His elder brother is Dada,

or nature—from ‘da,’ to create; his younger is the River Ogun; his

friend and associate is Orishako, god of farms; his slave, Biri, or

darkness; his wives are the Rivers Oya (Niger), Oshun, and Obba; and his

priest is Magba, the Receiver—not a bad name. His worshippers carry a

bag, because he was fond of predatory wars. Practically, Shango is the

deity of thunder, lightning,[104] and fire: he is also called Jákuta, or

the stone-thrower, and he favours the good, especially protecting

hunters, fishermen, and warriors. Wherever lightning has struck, or an

aërolite[105] has fallen, there Shango has been; when a house is fired,

or is struck by lightning, the priests and mob rush in to find the

stone, and seize the opportunity of plundering; besides which, they

claim a general right to steal goats and chickens. Shango’s symbol is a

small wooden bat, called ‘ose,’ with a handle one foot long. He is

consulted by throwing sixteen pierced cowries: if eight fall upwards and

eight downwards, it is peace; if all are upwards, it is also a good

sign; and, _vice versâ_, if all fall with their teeth to the ground, it

is war.

The last of the triad is Ifa, which appears to be not a person, but a

myth, originating at the town of Ife.[106] He is the revealer of

futurity, and the patron of marriage and childbirth. His high priest—the

head of the Babbalawo, or Fathers of Secrets—is said to live upon a

mountain near Awaye, a gigantic cone of granite eight to ten miles in

circumference, seen from the distance of several days’ journey towering

solitary above the landscape, and surmounted, it is said, by a palm-

tree, bearing sixteen boughs, produced by the sixteen nuts planted by

the sixteen founders of the Yoruban empire. His chief priest at Abeokuta

is known as Obba Limore, King of the grove; and none but the secret-

keeping sex is initiated into the mysteries. As the great oracle, Ifa

supports a large family, who live gratis upon the offerings of the

devotees—sheep and goats, fowls and pigeons.[107] The priests are known

by their bead necklaces, small strings twisted together, with ten large

white and green beads, some inches apart. They officiate in white, and

constantly use a fly-whisk. Their deity being called Bángá, God of Palm-

nuts, they choose as his symbols those that are placental with four

holes. The operation of casting lots is intricate, and is variously

described by different observers: odd and even, and ‘heads or tails,’

appear to be the ruling principles.[108] Ifa proved unexpectedly—if not

paid for the purpose—a friend to the white man at Abeokuta. When

consulted whether missionaries should be admitted, he answered, ‘Yes.’

When it was further inquired whether a church might be founded at

Igbeni, he replied in the affirmative. The pious of Understone refer his

general correctness to the operation of evil spirits: on this occasion,

however, as in many others, Satan seems to have amused himself with

casting out sin.

Besides these three great Orishas, there are many Di minorum gentium,

who are, even more palpably, men and women of note in their day—of whom

only the principal will be noticed.

Ogun is the god of blacksmiths and armourers. He is also the patron of

hunters and warriors, in which quality human sacrifices are offered to

him. The victim is decapitated, the head is affixed to a tree, and the

body is placed publicly before the symbol, a dwarf, spear shaped, iron

or copper, to which a chain is attached.

The sun and the moon are worshipped at Ife, ‘the Pantheon of Yoruba,’

where a brazen chair and brass images of these objects fell from heaven.

A peculiar worship in this country is Ori, which means the worshipper’s

own head, seeming to involve the idea of luck or good fortune. Other

parts of the body are worshipped; the foot, for instance, before

proceeding on a journey—and most African travellers will sympathize with

this sentiment. The symbol of Ori is half a calabash stuck with almonds,

like a pudding, till the substance can hardly be seen, and hung about

with long strings of the same shell. This is placed upon the ground, and

duly adored. A similar emblem belongs to Dada, whom the missionaries

translate Nature, but who is rather the god or genius of newly-born

children. His sign is a cawl, and he is worshipped as a calabash,

provided with longer strings than those of Ori.

Odua or Odudua, the universe, or the goddess of earth and sky, is

located at Ife.[109] Oye is the Yoruban Æolus, the Harmattan, a giant,

residing in a cave of the winds at Igbetti, one of the highest mountains

in Yoruba, between Igboho and Ilori: during the dry season he rushes out

and breathes cold over the land: in Hausa ice is not unknown.

The idol Oriskako—_i.e._, Orisha Oko—patron of farms, has its head-

quarters—_i.e._, its priests and sacrifices—at Irawo, a town in Western

Yoruba. Its symbol is a large iron bar, and its worship is very

expensive. The people have a tradition that in the olden time a six-

fingered giant dwelt at the Egba town of Igbehi. When summoned to swear

by Oriskako, at Irawo, he waxed wroth, slew the priests, and carried off

ten of the sacred bars, for which reason no native of Igbehi is allowed

to enter Irawo.

The ‘Orisha of children’ is a truly hideous little image, carried about

by women, in their waist-clothes, when one of twins dies or is

destroyed:[110] consequently these idols are of two sexes. The male,

about a span and two fingers high, is in the rudest semblance of a man,

mounted on a little circular pedestal, with a head like a Pongo’s, a

top-knot of hair, huge ears, prognathous jaws, projecting lips, and thin

lozenge-shaped cuts on the forehead, and on each cheek three similar

horizontal and three perpendicular. The body—but little longer than the

head, or broader than the feet—is in the style of the coarsest Hindu

idol: a kind of pent-roof descends from the waist, exposing the legs,

which are much shorter than the forearm. The feminine figure is wholly

nude, in equally symmetrical proportions, finished as certain statues

outside the Pitti Palace at Florence, and with a bosom of the largest

dimensions, showing the true African _beau-idéal_. These idols are both

adorned with rings and bracelets of beads: they are hardly to be bought

at Abeokuta: at Lagos, however, two men make them, at the rate of three

shillings each. I sent a pair for the edification of those at home.

With all these beneficent deities, it would be curious if the Egbas

neglected the worship of the bad god—the Guebre’s Ahriman. Accordingly,

we find they have a terrible evil entity, whom they call Eshu, the

Rejected—from ‘shu,’ to cast out—and whom the missionaries identify with

the Devil, who is palpably a Semite. Eshu is probably some bad ghost,

who has made a name amongst the million. Of the same kind is Akilasho.

Eshu is also called Elegbárá, the mighty and evil being, stronger than

good: he is propitiated by small offerings; his symbol, erroneously

called an altar, is a bit of stone—a rude conglomerate of pebbles set in

clay, tinged with oxide—and upon this palm oil is poured. Vestiges of

this ‘devil worship’[111] are everywhere to be seen in the streets of

Abeokuta. The Egbas have borrowed from the Moslem Fula the word Ibilisi,

the Arab Iblis or Sathanas; amongst the latter, however, it is concrete

and objective, not so with the former. Orun Akpadi represents the rude

beginning of a future place of punishment; at present, however, it seems

to convey to their minds the next world—a faint idea of continuation is

familiar to most Africans, except to the most material tribes—where

evil-doers will expiate the sins of this life.

We now proceed to a third class of deities, which distinctly shows the

power of religion as a substitute for police or gendarmerie amongst a

barbarous people. The two principal persons—if they can so be called—are

Egugun and Oro.

Egugun—literally meaning ‘Bones’—is supposed to be a dead man risen from

the grave: he is called by Europeans the Aku Devil.[112] He is not

unknown at Lagos, but his powers are greater at Abeokuta and in the

northern parts of Yoruba. He is the local Mumbo Jumbo, the Ndá and

Kuhkwi of Southern Guinea, the Okuku of the Mpongwe, Bakele, and Shekani

tribes, the Makoko of Batanga, the Lú of Bambarra, and the Simo of the

Rio Nunez. ‘Egugun sha’au’—‘Egugun chop you!’—is the equivalent of our

‘Devil take you!’ I once met this ‘party’ in the streets. He was a tall

fellow, without the drawn sword mentioned by Mr. Bowen, but otherwise

most fantastically clad. His face was covered with a plaiting of net-

work, like a mask, and his head with a hood, whose streamers of red

scarlet crimson and dirty white hung down and mixed with the similar

tatters and patches of his lower dress. To his back, between the

shoulders, was suspended a German penny mirror, and his shoes, like

moccassins, completely hid his feet. The latter members he is not

supposed to possess; and the same was thought of Europeans before they

were seen to remove their boots and stockings. Egugun replied with a

curious and studied grunting to our facetious salutations, and moved out

of the way of the horses. It is said that if any one—even the

king—touches him, the man must die. Adult males, and even the free-born

boys, know Egugun to be a mortal; but if a woman swears falsely by him,

or even says that he is not a tenant of the grave, she would lose her

life. The missionaries have declared that ‘even Mohammedans and

Christians are obliged to conceal their knowledge of the imposture under

penalty of martyrdom’—but this, I think, is hardly probable. Egugun,

then, is a ‘Raw bones and bloody head,’ apparently intended to keep

slaves, women, and children in a state of due subjection: he is the whip

and the cucking-stool apotheosised. In Southern Guinea the women have a

counteracting institution called Njembe.

If Egugun represent the domestic, Oro personifies the public police; and

it is explained as ‘the executive or vindictive power of civil

government deified.’ The word properly means pain, torment, punishment.

The derivation has naturally been sought in ‘Orun, the sun; in the

Hebrew Aur; in the Ur of the Chaldees; in οὐρανὸς; in the Egyptian

Pharaoh; in the Orotalt or Urrat-Ilat (fire-goddess) of the Pagan Arabs;

in Aurora and Aurum, and, more remote still, in the Madagascan Auru, the

Philippine Arao, and the Peruvian Uru;’ but apparently, by going

farther, philological vagary has fared worse. We will rest contented,

then, with its primary meaning, ‘punishment’—when a criminal is killed,

he is ‘given to Oro,’ and thus the penalty assumes a Macchiavellian

mystery—and we will conclude that it represents to the Egba what Nemesis

did to the Greek and Roman.

Oro is a _vox et præterea nihil_, and an idea common to Yoruba; I

afterwards found him flourishing at the city of Great Benin. Like

Egugun, he is supposed not to be known to the women—as if that were

possible!—and I have seen an Egbanized Englishman show terror on hearing

his name mentioned in public. Mr. Bowen has been greatly blamed by the

Abeokutans for revealing the great secret in print. Oro is supposed to

haunt the woods, and when he appears it is for the purpose of striking

terror. Nightly, about 7 or 8 P.M., the cry of ‘Oro’ (the voice of my

father) resounds in the streets; at this savage tocsin the women must

fly within doors, under the usual penalty, a violent death. It was not

without trouble that the missionaries obtained permission for their

female converts to attend service on Sunday evenings. Oro, however, does

not visit the market-places, and he disappears before a party of men

with lanterns. This African curfew is produced by a thin slip of wood,

about one foot long by a few inches in breadth, fastened to a stick by a

long string, which allows it to ascend and descend, thereby raising and

lowering the tone. I recommend this utensil—whose curious booming noise,

as it sounds through the shades of night, is imposing enough—to Mr. Hume

and the Spiritualists. It is as superior to the silk kerchief and the

easy-tongs as the Thug’s silken cord is to the foul fustian sleeve of

the English garotter. The voice of Oro is accompanied by a terrible

caterwauling, in imitation of wild beasts; and he appears to be

everywhere—the fact is, he is stationed in all the different quarters of

the city. As a _vox_, he curbs the irregularities which would be

favoured by the darkness of night and the shading trees. He is certainly

armed, and probably he consists of a strong party. A corpse whose throat

has been cut, and whose shin-bones have been broken with fearful

violence by this ‘spirit,’ may at times be seen.

I was not fortunate enough to witness an Oro day; the ceremonies,

however, were lengthily explained to me. It takes place only on

occasions of great palavers. The principal requisite is that no woman

must be seen out of doors; and the object is obvious—to insure a decent

silence during debate. We read in ‘Appleton’[113] that the old Mohawks

always avoided speaking whilst paddling across the Saratoga Lake. On one

occasion an Englishwoman persuaded them to ferry her over, which they

did with the promise that their custom should be respected. The strong-

minded Britoness, when half way over, determined to ‘show the savages

the weakness of their superstition,’ and to that effect uttered a loud

cry. Nothing followed, and the chief was rallied upon the subject of his

fears. ‘The Great Spirit,’ replied the Mohawk, with much truth, ‘is

merciful; he knows that a white woman cannot hold her tongue.’ Now the

Egbas have found in their simplicity the method of doing what the

Eastern proverb declares to be impossible—of curbing a certain member of

a certain sex.

When the town is ‘given to Oro,’ as the phrase is, criers go about

shouting, ‘Atolo! Atolo! Ozez! Ozez!’ and striking clapperless unbrazed

bells like extinguishers. The women rush within the house—the gates are

apparently built for the purpose—and pass their hours in ‘knagging’ and

quarrelling. The men and boys go abroad; in places the streets are

desert as those of New York on Sundays, whilst others are crowded with

dancers and tumblers, processions and stump orators—in fact, with all

the material of a ‘palaver.’ The Ogbone lodges are filled with their

members, who discuss the important measure after the African fashion,

every one freely giving his own opinion, however far-fetched or

ridiculous. According to Mr. Campbell, severe whippings are then and

there administered to those offending with the fair sex. Breakers of the

seventh commandment, says Mr. Bowen, are obliged to run the gauntlet in

the public square. After sunset the firing of guns—which are not allowed

to be discharged during the hours of light—announces the conclusion of

an Oro day, when the town returns to its normal occupations.

The Egbas have no such thing as demonolatry because they have no demons,

or the genius which Christian philosophers opined to be evil spirits.

The distinction between diaboloi and daimonii is unknown to them; but

they believe in certain entities which, unless propitiated, will do them

evil. The missionaries Anglicise Egbiri by ‘ghost,’ and Emi by

‘spirit’—a manifest borrowing from the Pneuma, Psychos, Soma, that

compose the European Ego.[114] The hysteric sufferers known to the

ancients as daimonazomenoi and enthusiazomenoi, who, under fits, were

insensible, like the mesmeric subjects of the modern day, are common

amongst the Egbas, as indeed amongst all pure or nearly pure African

races. Of course there is the true African belief in ghosts, who are

supposed to desire men’s deaths, and the deceased is a vindictive thing

to be feared as long as remembered.[115] Witchcraft is common. The white

witch or witch-finder of the days of James I. is usually the fetish-man;

and according to the Mosaic law, the witch or wizard is not suffered to

live. Europeans often consider the crime fanciful, and waste a great

deal of good pity upon victims to popular indignation. Setting aside the

Mosaic order and the Twelve Tables, the witch, it must be remembered,

believes in the power of her spells, and commits murder in her heart;

her incantations too often take effect—like the predictions of Mdlle. le

Normand—upon the silly superstitious souls around her; and not

unfrequently she brings arsenic, or something equally material—as the

homœopaths do calomel—to the aid of her spiritual powers.[116] On the

other hand, witchcraft has its good side, and is by no means the unmixed

evil that some hold it to be. Where the dark places of the earth are

full of cruelty, its vague terrors form a salutary check upon the

violence of husbands and masters, rulers and criminals. It is the power,

and the only power, of the weak.

Where witchcraft prevails, the talisman must be common. Here the grigri,

as it is barbarously called, is the prophylactic of the Jews, the amulet

of Christian Abyssinia and Syria, the cross and miraculous medal of

Southern Europe. So horse-shoes in England and the West Indies

neutralize evil influences; egg-shells hung in the chimney-corner make

chickens flourish, and extracted teeth are thrown over the house, or are

worn, to prevent toothache. A folio volume might be filled with these

fooleries of faith, which serve for two objects—the attainment of good

and the avoidance of harm in this life. I look upon them as the vestiges

of that fetishism which is the first dawn of religion in the breast of

the savage and the barbarian, and which cannot fail to crop out even

from the enlightened surface of monotheism. Besides which, belief or

superstition is, like happiness, most equally divided amongst men. Those

who balk at the possible will swallow the impossible, and those who

deride the credos of others must make up for themselves faiths of their

own, which appear quite as ridiculous to their neighbours. In the

present state of human nature, faith appears a necessary evil, an

inseparable weakness. Nor can we see any corrective of, or substitute

for it until, after the convulsion which follows the present period of

quiescence, a higher race—as the elephant is to the mastodon—succeeds

the present.

Witchcraft also necessitates ordeals; these, however, are not the

Judicia Dei, as they were held to be in Europe. They rather correspond

in action with the Erinnyes and the Eumenides of ancient Greece. The

poisons and drugs are intelligent beings, which, entering the stomach

that here represents man’s heart in its sentimental sense, searches out

his guilt and sin. At times, finding nothing of evil, it returns by

emetism, and thus establishes the innocence of the accused; at others,

it discovers the material element of witch-power—the aorta has been

shown as an irrefragable proof—and it kills the wizard by the

mismanagement of a weapon intended for the destruction of others; he is

hoisted with his own petard; he falls into the pit which he digged for

his brother. Trial by poison ordeal, however, is not so fatally common

as the sancy water and the poison bean, which sweep away whole families

and even villages on the coast and on the Oil Rivers; nor is it

accompanied with the horrors that distinguish it at Badagry and ill-

famed Dahome. The priest will squirt capsicum or bird-pepper juice into

the eyes of the accused, and lachrymation proves guilt: this, however,

appears rather in the light of a torture to make criminals confess.

Certain Yoruban cities are said to have local ordeals, but little is

known of them at Abeokuta.

Dreams, according to the Yorubans and to many of our fetishists, are not

an irregular action, and partial activity of the brain, but so many

revelations brought by the manes of the departed. They believe in a

physical metamorphosis, which Europeans insist upon confounding with

metempsychosis, or the transmigration of souls. The former is simple and

purely natural; the latter is a complex and contradictory system,

postulating the existence of what is proofless; an immortal nonentity

called Spirit, created out of nothing—despite ‘ex nihilo nihil fit’—in a

limited number for an unlimited number of human beings, and destined to

end where it began, and whence its beginning was consequently uncalled

for. But Europe cannot deride Asia in this particular. He who denies or

demands proof that a soul or spirit exists, who considers ‘Mind’ to be

the working of the brain, and who holds ‘Matter,’ as it is popularly

understood, sufficient for all human phenomena, is held in a holy

horror. To me it appears that he rather honours the Omnipotent who can,

out of so vile a body, produce effects which others must attribute to

their mysterious ‘dweller in the temple,’ must in fact solve their

difficulties by adding a supplement to the Book of Creation.

It is hard to say whence came the tales invented by the African to

explain the inferiority of the black to the white man. Their

universality induces me to think them an emanation from the Hamitic

brain. Nothing so puzzles and perplexes the negro as to inform him that

all nations were made of one flesh; it is an insult to his Common Sense

which Time only can efface. The much-vexed Noachian flood is of course

found for them in their legends of local inundations. As might be

expected amongst a working people, there is already an idea of a

week[117]—a decimal week, like that of the Aztecs and Javans, containing

five days. The terminal day of rest is called Ose, when water is brought

for the deities in long processions, libations are poured out, and other

religious ceremonies are performed. A month of four weeks, each

consisting of five days, gives an equal number of units to each whole;

with us the system is so complicated that we cannot remember it without

a schoolboy rhyme—moreover, all the weeks are comprehended without

fractions in the year.

It is a question whether the intercourse of more progressive creeds is

or is not modifying the Yoruban mythology. The older hands declare that

faith is gradually decaying, and that Oro is not nearly so powerful as

in their day; and they vainly attempt to arouse the enthusiasm of the

people by petty attempts at a persecution. Old age, however, is and

always will be _laudator temporis acti se puero_; on the other hand,

there are residents who assert that the idolatries are not diminishing,

and that cannibalism and human sacrifices, which were once performed in

public, are now practised under the rose. My time did not permit me to

enter deeply into these troublesome questions. Mr. Crowther[118] has

accused the Egbas (his own tribe) of boiling and eating the bodies of

certain Ijebu invaders, in order to terrify the enemy;[119] and declares

that Ikumi, chief of the Ijebu, was guilty of a similar savagery. The

missionary, however, like the antiquary, is always somewhat credulous on

the subject of heathen malpractices. Concerning human sacrifice I have

something in a future page.

There is nothing remarkable in the marriage rites of the Egbas.

Betrothal takes place early, although the girl is rarely married before

eighteen or twenty, and the dowry, amongst the middle classes, may be

four dollars. The bride and bridegroom repair to Ife, or some other

place of pilgrimage; pray, and sacrifice. At night the bridesmaids

escort the bride to her new home, where a feast leads to the

consummation of the marriage. If the groom be satisfied, he sends

presents to the wife’s family, especially to his mother-in-law, who is

called the ‘little mother,’ in contradiction to the true parent. If he

find reason to complain, he dismisses his bride, and sends, bitterly, a

few broken cowries to her mamma.[120] The marriages are not very

prolific; ‘fecundity diminishes in proportion as we advance from

temperate regions to the poles and the equator.’ All Africans—amongst

whom there is a curious Malthusian instinct—possess anaphrodisiacs, and,

finally, the prolonged lactation, by determining the vital current to

the breast, prevents the women from becoming mothers. There are few

ceremonies after birth: a name is presently given to the child, and, as

amongst the Mpongwe of the Gaboon River, water is sprinkled upon it—a

faint resemblance to the modern, not the ancient, baptism of the

Christians. The son inherits all the father’s wives save his own mother.

Polygamy is of course the foundation-stone of Yoruban society. I cannot

remember a single African or Asiatic tribe—except the polyandrous—in

which this is not the case, and the rule is equally applicable to the

North American aborigines. Europe forms, and almost always has formed,

the sole exception. To account for this fact perhaps a few lines may not

be out of place.

The savage and the barbarian are polygamic because they are dependent

for the necessaries and for the little comforts of their poor existence

upon a plurality of women and the number of their children. Servants are

unknown; slaves are rare. A single wife cannot perform all the offices

required even in the simplest stage of society. Moreover, there is, in

the different races or sub-species of mankind, as amongst the humbler

animals, a greater or a lesser difference, bodily and mental, between

the two sexes. In the gallinaceæ the male is far nobler than the female;

in the equines the two are nearly equal; in the falconidæ the female is

stronger and braver than the male. Thus, in the European and the

Hindu,[121] the woman is quasi-equal with the man; in the African, the

American, and the lower races of Asiatic, she is inferior and

monogamous, whilst his propensities are polygamic.

Amongst the Jews there was at first no attempt at the vulgar limitations

of the family. ‘The care of the Mosaic, as of other Oriental

legislation, was directed to the protection of the woman from harsh

behaviour or capricious desertion, and to the fair treatment of the

offspring without reference to the mutual affection of the parents. That

the man who associated with a virgin incurred the charge of her

protection, and that the mother, by the very act of maternity, assumed

the lesser dignity of the wife, were the foundations of the domestic

morals of the ancient world, the guiding principles of the social

life.’[122] Samuel and the Patriarchs had two and more spouses, Solomon

a countless harem, as became a king of kings, and Cato looked upon his

wife merely as a machine for the manufacture of progeny. As society

became more complex, a certain limitation became necessary. The

customary laws of the Jews confined the high-priest to one wife, and

apostolic injunction continued the same to the Christian bishop,

without, however, forbidding a plurality of wives to the laity or to the

other officers of the Church. It is hard to believe that this want of

express condemnation arose from mere expediency, from the danger of

disruption of the Oriental home, and from the fear of its being an

obstacle to the conversion of the wealthier classes. Those familiar with

modes of thought in the East well know the horror and loathing with

which the people generally look upon the one-wife system, their contempt

for the bastard, and their inability to witness in their own society

those scenes which the monogamic cities of Europe must tolerate for fear

of even greater social evils to the family. The ordinary Hebrew was

ordered to be contented with four wives, a practice perpetuated by the

apostle of El Islam and the king to eighteen. Thus Josephus distinctly

called polygamy ‘the custom of his country.’ Nor was it modified till

the depression of the Jew’s social position compelled him to follow the

laws and customs of the nations amongst whom he was located. ‘In the

eleventh century Rabbi Gerson, in connection with other Jewish doctors

in France and the north of Germany, prohibited marrying more than one

wife under pain of excommunication, and this was afterwards accepted by

most European congregations. Nevertheless, both in Italy and Germany

there seems to have existed the permission to take a second wife, when

the first was hopelessly barren, and Papal dispensations to this effect

are recorded to have been given in the dominions of the Holy See as late

as the seventeenth century (_vide_ “Historia degli riti Hebraici,” by

Leo. Mutensis, 1657, cited by Selden in his “Uxor Hebraica”); while in

Sicily, where the Saracenic traditions might still linger, the author of

the “Ebraismo della Sicilia,” writing in 1748, attributes the rapid

increase of the Jewish population to the enforced early marriages and

the habitual practice of polygamy.’[123] (P. 20. By Giovanni de’

Giovanni: Inquisator Reale della suprema Inquisizione di Sicilia.)

It is, as the reviewer well remarks, entirely gratuitous to suppose

that, at the time of the advent of Christ, the general Jewish custom of

polygamy had fallen into desuetude in consequence of the prohibition by

Roman manners, if not by Roman laws. The reverse was the case; the rigid

monogamy of the early Italians was disappearing in the presence of a

less austere and a more sensuous life. ‘The almost sacramental Sabine

ceremony of the _confarreatio_ (of which we still retain a relic in our

“bride-cake”) was rapidly becoming confined to the use of the Pagan

priesthood; the wife was daily ceasing to regard her husband as _amicum,

patrem, tutorem_; the dignity and privilege of the _materfamilias_ had

declined to the position of _uxor tantummodo_; the married Antony had

openly espoused Cleopatra, and the _quotidiana repudia_ of Mæcenas

shocked only the stoic Seneca.’ To this I will add that the old-bachelor

system appeared in its entirety amongst the philosophers and wits,

_teste_ one Horatius Flaccus, who might have been a club-man of the

present day.

During a missionary dinner at Abeokuta I was somewhat startled by an

account of their treatment of polygamic converts. Having accidentally

mentioned that a Protestant bishop in South Africa had adopted to

advantage the plan of not separating husband and wives, I was assured

that in Yoruba the severe test of sincerity was always made a _sine quâ

non_ before baptism. This naturally induced an inquiry as to what became

of the divorcees. ‘We marry them,’ said the Rev. Mr. Gollmer, ‘to some

bachelor converts.’ This appeared to me the greatest insult to common

sense, the exercise of a power to bind and to loose with a witness; a

right to sanctify adultery pure and simple, to do evil that good may

come of it,[124] a proceeding which may make any marriage a no-marriage.

But I was still more astonished to find, when quoting the opinion of

Martin Luther, in the case of Philip of Hesse, that several reverend

gentlemen had never heard of it, and most when the Rev. Mr. Gollmer, who

manifestly made acquaintance with it for the first time, opined that the

said Martin Luther had so lately emerged from the darkness of Romanism,

that on this point his inner vision was not strong enough to face the

light.[125]

The reverend gentleman’s last objection struck me the more forcibly, as

it is evident that to the Roman Catholic Church—which, when barely

adolescent claimed, and still claims in her decrepitude, the right of

precedence over the State—we owe, in modern times, the most curious

limitation of human liberty ever forced upon mankind. Let us see what

the reviewer says upon the subject. I will abridge his excellent sketch.

No council, during the first centuries of the Church, denounced polygamy

as a sin, but the apostolic limitation of the bishop’s household was

soon applied to the whole ministry, and, in the West penalties were

attached to the practice. The Manicheans and Gnostics condemned marriage

in toto, because it is founded on concupiscence and propagates the work

of the devil in confining human souls in bodies of matter: hence Mani

called his elect or perfect—the class above the hearers—men-virgins.

This heresy was rebutted, but it seems to have found place in the minds

of men. St. Jerome, who is accused by the Reformers of thinking too

exclusively of ‘victuals and virginity,’ would not undertake to declare

a polygamist in mortal sin (‘Epistle to Pammachius,’ where he writes

‘non damno polygamos’). St. Augustine (contra Faustum, lib. 22) is even

more precise: ‘Quando mos erat plures habere uxores, crimen non erat;

nunc propterea crimen est, quia mos non est.’[126] Polygamy was

forbidden throughout the empire by the imperial decrees of A.D. 393, but

within thirty years the Emperor Valentinian restored the liberty of

marriage, according to the several customs and religions of the

inhabitants of the Roman world. Even in later days the Merovingian kings

took as many wives simultaneously as suited their passions or their

politics, and ‘Charlemagne, an eminently Christian emperor, paraded as

large a harem as an Oriental sultan would have decorously concealed.’

Probably, in the presence of such disorders, that development of the

doctrine and discipline of the Roman Catholic Church took place which

ended in marriage being taken out of the category of personal contracts,

and, according to the character of the participants, crowned as a

sacrament or branded as a sin. In these latter days the claims of

polygamy have been wholly neglected. A late work (‘La Régénération du

Monde, opuscule dédié aux douze tribus d’Israël’) by M. Joseph de

Félicité, contains the following curious sentences:—‘Il est donc

essentiel que les peuples’ (Jews and Moslems), ‘sachant que la

Polygamie, qui a été autorisée et pratiquée jusqu’au temps de Jésus-

Christ, a été revoquée par lui’ (when? where?) ‘et qu’elle est interdite

par la Sainte Eglise suivant le décrit du Concile de Trent XXIVme

session: “Si quelqu’un dit qu’il est permis aux Chretiens d’avoir

plusieurs femmes, et que cela n’est défendu par aucune loi divine, qu’il

soit anathème.”’ But there is an older and a more terrible anathema upon

him who takes away from or adds to a word of what was spoken, and,

perhaps, even the Council of Trent will not be held guiltless.

It is, therefore, among the dissidents from the Church of Rome that we

must look for assertions touching the lawfulness of polygamy. The

advocates are of two classes. The first is of the Casuists—the German

Reformers, for instance—who permit the practice in exceptional cases of

individual temperament or state necessity, such as might be the subjects

of especial dispensation in the Roman Church; the second is of the

Moralists, who, without regarding polygamy as an absolute good, still

look on it as a preservative from the miseries and disgraces incident to

the illicit intercourse of the sexes in countries where marriage is

restricted and men are licentious.[127] To this class belong the Saxon

Lyserus (author of ‘Polygamia Triumphatrix,’ under the name of

Theophilus Aletheus), Bishops Berkeley and Burnet—who concludes by

saying that ‘he can see nothing so strong against polygamy as to balance

the great and visible imminent hazards that hang over so many thousands

if it be not allowed’—the Rev. Mr. Madan, who, in his ‘Thelyphthora,’

would give to seduction all the responsibilities of marriage, and the

‘oblique advocate,’ poetic Cowper. In 1784, the argument was revived in

Russia by the Comte de Rantzow, who asserted that Frederic of Sweden had

lately proposed to the states of his kingdom—where bigamy is punished

with extreme severity—to permit polygamy, and that the project had been

accepted by the two Lower, but rejected by the two Upper Houses of the

legislature.

To conclude; I would assure these and other missionaries that had less

objection been made to polygamy on their part, the heathen would have

found far fewer obstacles to conversion. Those who hold it their duty to

save souls, should seriously consider whether they are justified in

placing such stumbling-blocks upon the path of improvement.

Funerals play almost as important a part as weddings in the economy of

Yoruban society. The preliminary wake takes place in the verandah of the

dead man’s house, which, like the king’s audience room, is hung with the

richest cloths procurable. The ceremony itself reminds us of the old

Scotch annalist’s words: ‘In years of plenty,’ says Fletcher of Saltoun,

‘many thousands of them meet together in the mountains, where they feast

and riot for many days, and at country weddings, markets, burials, and

other public occasions, they are to be seen, both men and women,

perpetually drunk, cursing, blaspheming, and fighting together.’ Women

are there skilful in weeping and shrieking ‘like mandrakes torn from the

ground;’ the sound of the tom-tom is incessant; at times an overloaded

musket is discharged; whilst the mob drinks to intoxication and dances

to ‘break the fear,’ as the East Africans say. During the orgies, a

procession perambulates the town, numerous singers, dancers, and

myriologists, or keeners, accompanying men who bear a board covered with

a cloth to represent a corpse. The body, packed mummy-like in all the

finery which was never exposed during lifetime,[128] is buried at full

length in the house where the deceased lived, and a stone is placed over

the grave, or a painted tablet is affixed to the wall opposite the spot.

Hunters and other castes are buried outside the city gates. The corpses

of debtors and ‘pawns,’ or men pledged for debt, are tied up in mats, as

on the Gold Coast, and are placed horizontally between stakes at a

distance of four to five feet from the ground, where they must remain

until redeemed by the nearest of kin. Infants are buried behind the

housewalls, not in the piazza, because they are supposed to have been

killed by evil influences. On the seventh night, the relations and

friends of the departed issue from the city gates after dark, cast his

arms and clothes on the way-side, thrice call upon his name, and adjure

him not to let, haunt, or otherwise injure them. After thus propitiating

the ghost, they return to the dead man’s house, where a feast and a

carousal end the ceremonies.

Human sacrifices for the dead, or ‘customs,’ so common in many parts of

Africa, are here comparatively rare; when offered, it is with the idea

of presenting to the departed what is most valuable to the living;[129]

and, as has been observed, a modified apotheosis is common. In Roman

Catholic countries the deceased, if not too severely handled by the

devil’s advocate, may after a century or so, and at an expense of

10,000_l._, become a saint—at Abeokuta he has a chance of being raised

to the godhead. The Cairene superstition of the dead refusing to leave

the town, the bier whirling round and round, and the bearers being

driven hither and thither, is not unknown: here, however, if the people

are thrown against the wall of a man’s house, it involves the latter in

a witchcraft ‘palaver,’ which he must settle by fine or by the poison

ordeal.

[Footnote 86: When we first occupied the unhappy valley of the Indus,

the Sindhian women used to bathe without dress at the wells: with Moslem

decorum they were safe, but the Frank soon changed all that.]

[Footnote 87: Lagos kills a consul about every two years. The only way

to remedy it would be to sleep for the first year on board a ship, or

still better, a large hulk anchored off the town in mid-channel. At

night the malarious vapour is condensed and concentrated by the

chilliness of the ground, and is absorbed or rendered innocuous by

passing over a sheet of water.]

[Footnote 88: The European fashion is best adapted for heavy axe-blades

in temperate climates. In the tropics the wood, alternately wetted and

parched, shrinks, swells, and rots. I prefer, to all, a hollow iron

handle, firmly riveted to the blade.]

[Footnote 89: I sent some to England, where their novelty and

grotesqueness caused them to be greatly admired.]

[Footnote 90: An account of the Egba dispersion will be given in a

future page.]

[Footnote 91: Figurative. There are but few wild bees, and honey is

unknown in this part of Africa.]

[Footnote 92: Mr. Senior, and probably others, opines touching ‘plural

government,’ that ‘the Greeks were the inventors of the system of

dividing the sovereign power among a number of co-ordinate persons,

whose combined assent was necessary to an act of supreme authority.’ He

would have found the principle and the practice in the remotest and most

barbarous of African tribes.]

[Footnote 93: It is not cultivated, and therefore little prized by

natives: the flavour of turpentine is its characteristic.]

[Footnote 94: This curious admission reminds me of the words of a

certain preacher: ‘Now, my brethren, Conscience is not, as some say, a

geographical or a chronological accident,’—a fatal sentence, never to be

forgotten, I am sure, by many of his hearers.]

[Footnote 95: Mr. Bowen steps into the absurd, by enunciating the

doctrine, that ‘no _man_ has ever believed in two gods.’ He should have

said, no free-born citizen of the Great Republic.]

[Footnote 96: Some writers (_e.g._ ‘Savage Life in Africa.’ Home and

Foreign Review, July, 1862,) have objected that ‘it does not follow,

because a savage calls God and sky by the same name, that therefore he

necessarily confuses one with the other. Hebrews, Greeks, and Latins had

one name for spirit, breath, and wind; but we cannot therefore conclude

that they identified them. The foundation of reason is the power of

using symbols, _i.e._, of making one thing stand for another, which is

known to be different from it.’ But this is a vicious analogy. The

Hebrews, Greeks, and Latins were not savages: I only assert, that in the

undeveloped human mind the confusion of name points to the confusion of

sense—that the metaphysical idea is subordinate to the physical.

Nezuhualcoyotl, the great Mexican king, when weary of idols, raised a

temple ‘al Dios no conocido, causa di los causas.’ If this be no

priestly pious fraud, Mexico, like Athens, had the foot lifted for

another step in advance when Christianity, the fourth and penultimate

act of the great drama, appeared on the stage of life.]

[Footnote 97: Did Mungo Park ever write this ‘Encyclopædist’ sentence?]

[Footnote 98: From the Hindu to the Romanist, no educated man really

adores the picture or image; and, I suspect, few uneducated men do

otherwise than adore it. This should be a serious consideration with

those who allow and contend for what Moses absolutely forbade—the bowing

before graven images. The Iconoclasts of early Christianity, and the

Apostle of El Islam, doubtless found the abuse of such ornaments greater

than their use, and told the people to hold them in abomination.]

[Footnote 99: ‘The present Alake succeeded Shodeke, a man so venerated

as to be ranked among the demigods.’—(Mr. Campbell, p. 40.)]

[Footnote 100: Mr. Bowen says that ‘Iyangba herself is Obatala. The two

are one, or, in other words, Obatala is an androgyne, representing the

productive energy of nature, or the generative principle, as

distinguished from the creative power of God.’ But this explanation

appears extra Indo-European. On the other hand the Rev. Mr. Crowther

calls Obbatalla ‘the great goddess of Yoruba, supposed to be the framer

of the human body in the womb.’ The fact that this diety is male,

female, and hermaphrodite, is a fair specimen of pagan vagueness.]

[Footnote 101: So the Spiritualists or Fetishists of the present day

assert that everything on earth is but a copy, of which the antitype is

to be found in the other.]

[Footnote 102: The worship of Shango, however, is not known in Great

Benin.]

[Footnote 103: She is denoted by a little idol, with dull yellow skin,

blue hair, white beads, and striped dress.]

[Footnote 104: The authoress of ‘A Residence at Sierra Leone’ (p. 96)

tells us, ‘Many of the liberated Africans worship lightning,’ and is

told by a Christian convert, that an Aku man, who offered himself as a

groom, ‘no do for horseman, he worship de tunder.’ Of course the man was

a devotee of Shango.]

[Footnote 105: A Shango-stone was showed to me; it was a bit of white

quartz.]

[Footnote 106: There are probably two Ife. One is placed in our maps in

the province of Kakanda, between Aku-land and the Niger. According to

some, it has lately been destroyed: the spot is worthy of exploration.

The mythical Ife was founded by Obalofu, and there worship (_alias_

idolatry) is said to have originated. As the first place made by the

Creator, it has become the market of ghostland—the dead there go to sell

and buy.]

[Footnote 107: The place of the Mganga, or medicine-man of the South—the

rain-maker or rain-stopper, like the χαλαζοφύλακες, and those who

practised aquælicium in classical Europe—is supplied in Yoruba, as we

might expect, from the comparative complexity of the system, by a great

variety of priestly drones.]

[Footnote 108: The priest brings his nuts in a rhinoceros horn from the

upper country. Holding the sixteen in his left hand, he takes them up at

random—as we do at a ‘bean club’—in his right, and the operation is

repeated till either two, called ‘ofu,’ or one, called ‘ossa,’ remains.

The chosen nut is then rolled, with the middle finger, over the earth,

or over a board whitened with the dust made by tree-worms. Finally, it

is marked with certain lines, which, by deciding the value and the

nature of sacrifice, procure success.

An old converted priest thus performed the ceremony in my presence. He

counted sixteen nuts, freed them from dust, and placed them in a bowl on

the ground, full of yam half boiled, crushed, and covered with some

acrid vegetable infusion. His acolyte, a small boy, was then called,

made to squat near the bowl, resting his body on the outer edge of the

feet, which were turned inwards, and to take from the fetish-man two or

three bones, seeds, and shells, some of which are of good, others of bad

omen. Elevating them, he rested his hands upon his knees. The adept cast

the nuts from one hand to the other, retaining some in the left, and

while manipulating, dropped others into the bowl. He then stooped down,

drew with the index and medius lines on the yam, inspected the nuts, and

occasionally referred to the articles in the boy’s hand. Thus he was

enabled to pronounce an opinion upon what was to happen.

I cannot flatter myself that the _modus operandi_ has been made quite

intelligible to the reader, for the best of reasons—I do not quite

understand it myself. The system is far more simple in Dahome, and at

some future time I may explain it.]

[Footnote 109: Mr. Crowther mentions that Odudua was situated in front

of the Council House at Ake, and that sacrifices of beasts and fowls

were made to it every five days, in order to obtain children, wealth,

and peace.]

[Footnote 110: Twins, however, at Abeokuta are not necessarily killed,

as in the Oil Rivers further south, or amongst the Kamskatkans, and many

of the North American aborigines.]

[Footnote 111: Here, as in other parts of Africa, Christian Europeans,

like Moslems, call all idols ‘devils,’ and foolishly believe that every

image, tree, stone, charm, and amulet are objects of worship, pure and

simple.]

[Footnote 112: Europeans, as has been said, call all the native objects

of worship ‘devils,’ indiscriminately. The practice is incorrect, but

dates of old. ‘All the gods of the Gentiles are devils,’ says the

Psalmist.]

[Footnote 113: ‘Illustrated Handbook of American Travel.’ New York:

Appleton and Co.]

[Footnote 114: Like the Mbuiti of the Mpongwe, or Gaboons. The word

‘spirit’ is always used in these cases: nothing can be more incorrect

than the secondary idea which it conveys, yet I am at pains to find a

better. ‘Emi’ is synonymous with the Hebrew ‘Ruach’ (breath).]

[Footnote 115: The Basutos think that the ghosts of their ancestors are

always endeavouring to draw them to themselves (‘Casalis,’ p. 249). M.

du Chaillu (ch. xix.) very truly shows that no negro fears the ghost of

his grandfather or his great-grandfather, proving, as has been well

remarked, the shortness of thought which is characteristic of the

African.]

[Footnote 116: In one of the silliest of modern effusions, the ‘Night

Side of Nature,’ where black magic is traced to the power of the will,

we read: ‘It is extremely absurd to suppose that statutes were created

to suppress a crime which never existed.’ The crime did exist, and does

exist, amongst the ignorant and barbarous: the light of science, of

course, is an efficient exorciser.]

[Footnote 117: The Fulas, to mention no other African tribe, have not a

regular week.]

[Footnote 118: ‘Journal,’ &c., p. 185.]

[Footnote 119: The same is told of a cannibal race in Eastern Africa.]

[Footnote 120: This reminds one of the Hindostani slang ‘tutelí kaurí,’

or ‘broken cowrie,’ which in Africa becomes ‘broken calabash.’]

[Footnote 121: The Hindu race, in early times, made an approximation to

monogamy. The country was then almost civilized, and the population must

have been dense. The Semitic family shows the same phenomenon. But when

quoting the words of the Eastern poet—

‘His wives may never be four,

He will best consult his reason,

Best secure his home from treason,

Who takes one, and wants no more’—

they should be read rather as a grumble against the ‘legalities and

proprieties of society,’ than as a theory which could be generally

carried out. The Asiatic races that are inferior to the Arab and the

Hindu, have never, I believe, adopted monogamy, although polyandry has

been practised for centuries.]

[Footnote 122: I have borrowed these sentences, and almost all the

information contained in these paragraphs, from a Paper in the

‘Edinburgh Review,’ Jan., 1862. The reader will readily recognize the

master-hand in that admirable article. It is amusing, however, to see in

it what a poor halfpenny-worth there is of bread (monogamy) to an

intolerable deal of sack (polygamy). Whilst pages 19, 20, 21, 22, and 23

are devoted to showing that polygamy was a Mosaic institution,

unforbidden to the early Christians, and only rendered restrictive and

penal—principally by the Church of Rome—in modern times, a single

sentence informs us that the settlement of the question was left to old

Roman laws, to German manners, and to ‘the silent but absolute operation

of a religion, based on the sentiments with which no system of polygamy

seems to be compatible—freedom and love.’

An eminent Moslem divine—El Siyuti, I think—wrote a Moslem treatise on

what to avoid. Through some three hundred pages he indulges his reader

with a full description of the most voluptuous practices of the East—a

perfect worship of Bacchus and Venus. In the last he perorates,

beginning—‘This much, O reader, have I recounted unto thee, so that thou

mayest know the things forbidden unto thee,’ &c., &c.

With respect to the reviewer’s last assertion, viz., that Christianity

is based upon freedom and love—I doubt that the monogamic sentiment was

ever intended by it. And I doubt even more vehemently whether the

mixture of sentiment and passion, which we know by that name, has not

added to the miseries rather than conduced to the happiness of human

life. In my humble opinion, it is not one of the least merits of

polygamy that it abstracts from the parents an affection which it

bestows upon the progeny. As no man, it is said, can serve God and

Mammon, so no woman can equally love husband and children; even the same

woman, at different periods of her existence, will prefer one to the

detriment of the other. And whilst conjugal love contains the base alloy

of sexual feeling, parental affection is of all the most pure and holy.

The unselfish will find no difficulty in pointing out which to prefer.]

[Footnote 123: St. Augustine, Grotius, and other authorities, admit that

polygamy is more natural than monogamy, yet they declare—and they are

followed by Paley—that it would prevent increase of population. The

contrary is the case. Hippocrates, Harvey, Willoughby, Forster, and the

practice of the Mormons, show, that amongst all animals, mankind

included, polygamy tends to population by increasing the births of

female children. Dr. Johnson (‘Life,’ vol. iii., p. 71) says it is ‘not

natural for a man and a woman to live together in the married state.’

Balzac explains this, by observing that, ‘physically and morally, man is

man longer than woman is woman.’ Napoleon, the last of the three

Avataras of intellect, declares, in the Code Civile, ‘Le mariage ne

dérive pas de la nature.’

In the City of the Saints, I flattered myself it had been proved, that

whereas monogamy equalizes the birth of the two sexes, polygamy produces

more females, and polyandry more males. Hence came the deduction, that

‘Nature, our plastic mother, had prepared her children for all three

systems.’ The ‘British Quarterly Review,’ of Jan. 1st, 1862, in an un-

able article, thus reasons upon this adaptation principle:—‘If a man

breaks a leg, nature instantly adopts extraordinary measures to insure

its repair; but are we entitled to infer that she delights in fractured

limbs?’ If this be argument, there can be no more said upon the subject.

Polygamy and polyandry, amongst mankind, are the rule, not the

exception. Broken legs are the exception, not the rule. The comparison

of the ‘learned’ reviewer is, therefore, applicable to monogamy, not to

polygamy and polyandry.]

[Footnote 124: Martin Luther allowed Philip, Landgrave of Hesse, for

political reasons, to intermarry with a second wife, the first being

still living. (‘Memoirs of Luther,’ translated by M. Michelet: 1836. See

also ‘Athenæum,’ June 18, 1836.) The Reformer, who said, ‘If Sarah

refuses, take Hagar,’ regarded, like all the early Christians, saints

and sinners, marriage as a purely civil rite. He never hesitated, when

the object of union was impeded, to grant letters of divorce, and he

notably held that the polygamy practised under the Mosaic dispensation

was lawful in modern times. ‘For my part,’ he declares, ‘I confess that

I cannot oppose the man who may wish to marry several wives, and that I

do not think such plurality contrary to the Holy Scriptures.’ This is

true wisdom. Human liberty has been sufficiently abridged without

imagining further curtailments.]

[Footnote 125: The lax law makes the polygamic wife a legitimate wife,

the missionary declares her illegitimate and not respectable; he

degrades her in her own estimate, and he would drive her an outcast from

her home. Can aught be more absurd, more wicked?]

[Footnote 126: This ‘mos’ is equivalent with the Moslems’ ‘Rasm:’ the

importance attached to it is eminently Oriental, conservative opposed to

progressive. One is tempted to quote St. Augustine against himself: ‘Væ

tibi, flumen moris humani! Quis resistat tibi?’ (‘Conf.,’ i. 8.)]

[Footnote 127: There is nothing more curious in the moral world than to

watch the effects of restriction of marriage by increased luxury and

expense in England, France, and other so-called civilized lands.

Polygamy has been cast out except amongst the few who can afford to

practise an illegal concubinage, and polyandry has now become the last

resource of those unable or unwilling to marry.]

[Footnote 128: Some authorities say that cowries are placed in the tomb

as gold-dust is further west: others deny it.]

[Footnote 129: It must be remembered that human sacrifices prevailed

amongst all the polished people of the old and new worlds; in Greece

they were common until the days of Solon, and the Romans abolished them

only in A.C. 100.]

CHAPTER V.

THE USUAL SKETCH—GEOGRAPHICAL AND HISTORICAL.

The country properly called Yoruba, or, by older writers, Yarribah, and

Yahribah—imitations of the Hausa pronunciation—has larger limits than

those usually assigned to it. Mr. Bowen, for instance, gives as its

frontiers the lands of Nupe (Nufe, or Nyffe), Borghú, and the regions

known as the Sudan, on the north; the Bight of Benin or Slave Coast, on

the south—so far he is correct—on the east by Ibini, or Benin, and the

Niger; and on the west by Mahi and Dahome, or, as it is here called,

Idáhame. It is, however, abundantly evident that Benin and Dahome are

integral parts of Yoruba, somewhat differing in language, but identical

in manners, customs, and religion. I would accordingly make the Niger,

in 6° 45′ east long., and the Volta River, in east long. 1° 45′, its

extreme limits. Thus, instead of two hundred miles in breadth, the

irregular parallelogram will be about three hundred and fifty, and its

depth from north to south will be upwards of two hundred miles. The area

will be seventy thousand instead of fifty thousand square miles. The

population is set down at two millions, which may be safely doubled,

thus giving about twenty-five souls to the square mile.

There is also a Yoruba Proper, which includes the two former kingdoms of

Ife and Isehin. The southern limit lies about twenty miles beyond

Abeokuta, or sixty miles from the sea, and thence it extends northwards

to the frontiers of Borghú. The area is usually laid at thirty thousand

square miles, and the population at eight hundred thousand souls; nor is

this an over-estimate. In this part of Africa, though much of the

country is desert, the cities[130] are numerous, many of them are ten to

twelve miles in circumference, they contain thousands of houses, and

each holds from ten to threescore souls. There are also many smaller

towns numbering from two thousand to fifteen thousand people. In this

section of the country lies the ancient metropolis of Yoruba, Oyo (also

called Katanga or Eyeo), whence the people were known as Hios and Eyeos.

The old capital, which is said to have been twenty miles in

circumference, was destroyed by the Fulas and Hausas in 1825, when the

king established himself at the tent-market ‘Ago-ojjá,’ which is now

known by its former name, Oyo. The next most considerable cities are

Ibadan, now at war with Abeokuta; Ijaye, the hapless ally of the latter;

and Ilori. Besides which there are ten minor cities, whose names do not

require mention. Yoruba Proper is now well nigh Moslem.

Besides Yoruba Proper, and the kingdoms of Wari, Benin, and Dahome—the

latter was, according to native tradition, a mere tributary province—the

great Yoruba country contains seven independent territories, whose names

are as follows:—

1. Iketu, in our maps Ketu, with a capital of the same name, is a small

country lying between Agbome and the River Ogun, south of Yoruba Proper,

and shut out from the sea. It has hitherto withstood the power of

Dahome, and as the soil is poor, whilst timber and water are far from

abundant, it is not much coveted by its neighbours. The extent is

conjectured to be two thousand square miles, and the population one

hundred thousand.[131]

2. Ekko,[132] which the Portuguese called Lagos; the chief town is Aoni,

or Awini, _i.e._, descended from Ini or Bini—Benin. The limits are Egba-

land to the north, the sea to the south, the Ijebu country on the east,

and Badagry, now its dependency, on the west. Its area cannot be less

than one thousand square miles, and its population eighty thousand.[133]

3. Egba, which, with Iketu, forms the head-quarters of the so-called Aku

nation. It is a small kingdom lying on both sides of the Ogun River, but

principally on the left bank. It is bounded on the north by Yoruba

Proper, south by Ekko, east by Ijebu, and west by Iketu. It also

includes the fallen kingdom of Ota, lying between Badagry and Abeokuta.

The capital of Egba-land is Abeokuta, and there are no other

considerable cities. The area, including Ota, is about three thousand

square miles, and the population may be assumed at two hundred

thousand.[134]

4. Ijebu, popularly called Jaboo, lies between Egba-land and Benin: it

is bounded northwards by Yoruba Proper and Kakanda, southwards by the

sea, or more properly by the long lagoon called the Ikoradu, or Cradoo

Waters. It is divided into two parts, the Ijebu Ode to the east, and

westward the Ijebu Remo: the Awajali, or great king, however, resides at

Ode. The land has been little visited by travellers: it is described as

an undulating surface of bush and savannah. The area is set down at five

thousand square miles, the population at two hundred thousand souls. The

Ijebus, a warlike race, have ever been the most deadly enemies of the

Egbas, who, in return, gave them the bad name of being the most

barbarous of the Yoruban tribes.

5. Ijesha, whose capital is Ilesha, is a little-known province lying

between Yoruba and Kakanda: its area is set down at two thousand square

miles, and its population at two hundred thousand souls.

6. Kakanda,[135] more properly called Effong or Effon, extends from

Yoruba Proper to the Niger and the Kwara Rivers. This province is very

little known, but the people are celebrated for working copper, of which

they are supposed to have mines. In Kakanda is the celebrated Ife,

‘said,’ if we believe the maps, ‘to be the origin of idolatry.’ It is

the spot where the Yoruba nation and all others arose—the Eden of these

regions; moreover, from it sprang the sea, and they show the source of

the largest river known to them, namely, the Osa Lagoon, running between

Lagos and Godomé. The Dahomans, who, like other Yorubans, thence derive

their faith, call it Fe.

7. Ilori, which Richard Lander writes Alourie, a province and a city of

that name, inhabited by Moslem Fulas and Gambari,[136] a tribe of Hausa

men, together with a few pagan Yorubas. The king is a Fula, and the

chiefs are mostly Gambari and Kaniki.[137] About 1820 Ilori became

independent of Yoruba Proper: it then proclaimed the Jihad, and assisted

in the destruction of Oyo or Eyeo. Of late years Ilori has suffered at

the hands of Ibadan, but it has recovered since the latter people have

been weakened by their wars with Abeokuta. About 1850, Masaba of Nupe, a

half-caste Fula, made a coalition to attack Ilori and its chief Chítá, a

relation of his own, whose daughter he had married. Two years

afterwards, however, Masaba was driven out by his subjects, and Iláde,

his capital, on the banks of the Niger, was burnt. The King of Sokoto

then sent him to reside at Ilori as a private citizen. Shortly

afterwards he left it, and he now resides at Bidda, on the Kaduna, a

tributary of the Niger.

Ilori, like Tinbuktu and Sokoto, is one of the great marts of Central

Africa. All manner of European goods are imported _viâ_ the Desert from

Tripoli and other Mediterranean ports, although an easy land journey of

two hundred and fifty miles separates it from the Bight of Benin. The

Niger River also runs at no great distance to the eastward of it. The

exploitation of the whole Nigerian valley is in our hands if we choose

to take the trouble.

The word Yoruba has, as might be expected, been identified by the

ethnological sciolist with Europa. Sultan Mohammed Bello[138] derives

the name Yarba from Yarab, son of Kahtan, called Joktan by the Hebrew

annalist, and enumerated by Moslem genealogists amongst the Arab el

Ariba, or pure Arabs who preceded the Mutaarab, the Ishmaelitic et

insititious and impure Egypto-Arab race. Mr. Bowen derives it from Goru,

which in Fula means river, and _bah_ or _ba_, great. He is sensible

enough to place little confidence in his own philology; and, for the

most part, _bah_, as in Joli-bah, and Bah-fing, is believed to be an

African corruption of the Arabic _bahr_, a sea or large stream. The

popular derivation of Yoruba is Ori Obba, or ‘Head King’—with which, for

want of a better, we must fain be satisfied.

With respect to the origin of the Yoruban race, some hold that it is an

offshoot from Nupe, on the north of the Kwara, driven by a war across

the Niger when the river was swollen; and thus the ship, Okko, became

their emblem. They first founded Ife, and subsequently Igboho and

Oyo.[139] Another well-known tradition makes the Yoruban forefathers to

have been created at Ife, or rather at the obscurely remembered mythical

town of that name, four months’ journey to the east. Another declares

that they are descended from sixteen persons who were sent forth from

the east to found a colony. Their leaders took with them a hen and a

piece of cloth, containing a palm-nut in a few handfuls of mould. For a

time they waded through water, till the earth, dissolved through the

cloth, formed a bank in which the palm-nut grew to a tree with sixteen

branches, whereupon the hen sprang upon the bank and dried the

waters.[140] A third makes Iketu, Egba, Ijebu, Ife, Ibini, and Yoruba

six brothers by one mother. Yoruba, the Benjamin of the family, settled

at Ife, and after a time he reduced the others to the condition of his

dependents and vassals, when he removed to Igboho and made it his

capital. The great mother of the six tribes is still worshipped at Ife

and Abeokuta as Iyommodi (contracted from Iya ommo oddi), the mother of

the hunter’s children. Naturally enough the Moslems identify the hunter

with Nimrod, and his children with the Canaanites, who, driven to the

west, peopled the Sudan—Yauri and its vicinity. It is remarkable that

all these legends derive the population of Yoruba from the east;

and—even the fables which natives tell concerning their origin most

frequently show a modicum of truth—we are so far justified in believing

that from early times a race of pagans, pushed forward by the stream of

immigration from the lands nearer Arabia, occupied the thinly populated

countries south of the Kwara.[141]

We will now proceed to that province of the great Yoruban country which

most interests us—Egba-land. According to its Aku population, it

included at one time Dahome and the Popo, or races extending from

Badagry to the Volta River. At last the giant Lishabe—there were good

and bad giants in those days—rebelled against a Yoruban tyrant, and

vindicated the freedom of his country. This West African Kav or

Washington is now a god, and his farm, which it would be sacrilege to

reclaim, is pointed out on the east of the Ogun River, a little below

Abeokuta.

After their ‘declaration of independence’ the Egba race endured a

succession of terrible calamities, which led to their dispersion. Though

the worst must have happened almost within memory of man, there are many

conflicting statements accounting for it. According to some—and this is

the version recognized by the missionaries—the Egbas, after winning

their independence, were long governed by a king of their own; but

finally, growing weary of monarchy, they determined that every town

should be ruled by its own chiefs. This led to mutual jealousies and

dissensions; as might be expected, the oligarchies become more

tyrannical than despots, without possessing the virtues and the habits

of freemen. About fifty years ago this bad blood, stimulated by the

slave trade and by the machinations of the Yorubas and the Ijebus,

resulted in civil and internecine wars. In the course of twenty-five

years the numerous cities and towns which covered the land were all laid

waste with the sole exception of Oba, which is yet standing, about ten

miles south-west of Abeokuta. It is probable that five hundred thousand

people perished by sword and famine. Many were sold to the slave ships,

and the remnant of the tribe was scattered abroad. Others say that the

wars began about a little pepper in the market-town of Akponi—which

shows that the country was ripe for confusion. The people of Ife, Ikija,

Ikesi, Owu, and Ijebu, all armed against one another; whilst Afunja,

chief of Ilori; Alimi, a Fula of Sokoto; and Ali, chief of the Gambari

people, attacked Yoruba in force. Thousands of plunderers were already

at work; the sword and torch, famine, and the slave-ship completed the

destruction. Others declare that about two generations ago the Egbas had

a king who determined to rule them with absolute sway. He was quietly

directed to ‘go sleep,’ but he had the audacity to refuse. Then the

turbulent Egbas arose, and in full durbar slew their anointed king, who

claimed the right divine to do wrong. But the killing was murder in the

eyes of Oro; punishment followed the regicidal act with no lame foot.

The Fula Moslems of the Niger pressed upon Yoruba, Yoruba upon the

Egbas. The latter having no head, and being, though not absolutely

republican, a headstrong and unmanageable brood, began to fight among

themselves, and to sell one another in all directions. According to Mr.

T. B. Freeman, one of the earliest visitors to Abeokuta, a war had

lasted nearly a century between the kings of Dahome and of Great Benin.

The lands lying between the two rivals had suffered greatly; and even in

the present day the line of country between Badagry and Abeokuta, which

is one hundred miles long, does not contain more than five hundred

souls. In those days the Egbas dwelt to the eastward[142] of their

present homes, but were driven out by their neighbours the Ijebu, who

had sided with Benin. Under their chief, Ladmodi, the Egbas made head

against the violence of the enemy, but he was at last slain and the

tribe dispersed.

Without attempting to decide which account is true, it is evident that

during the first quarter of the present century there was a general

dispersion of the Egbas. We know that about 1820-22 there was a great

influx of Aku captives into Sierra Leone, and that they found their way

east and west, to the United States,[143] Gambia, Fernando Po, Hausa,

Borneo, Central Africa, the Fezzan, Egypt, and even to Stamboul. It was

a race worsted and spoiled, not, as is commonly asserted, by Europeans,

but by its own folly and want of proper despotism.

In 1825, as has been recounted, the Rock Olumo gave to a remnant of the

Egbas a rallying point. When their numbers were equal to the task, they

founded, about 1826, the town Abeokuta, under the chief Shodeke, who, as

the next in rank, had succeeded Ladmodi. The _novus homo_ then attacked

Ijebu, the old enemy, but after some successes he was defeated by a

coalition near Ekpe. The Ijebu raised another force, and fell upon

Shodeke. After a long campaign, however, they were compelled to retire,

losing one-third of their host. Shodeke then warred with Ilori, and

wrested from Yoruba Proper the little kingdom and city of Ota. He took

Ado, the key of the Badagry line, which connected him with the coast,

and he made an alliance with Dahome. In 1838 he invited Europeans to

settle in his capital; and he died honoured and revered in 1844.

The closer connection of Abeokuta with England dates from 1838-1839. In

that year certain Christian Akus or Egbas of Sierra Leone, freighted

with merchandize a small captured and condemned slaver—the class of

vessel was ominous of what was fated to happen—and, with a white man for

master and a crew of _emancipados_, sailed for Badagry. They were well

received, and presently they returned with a cargo of palm oil. Two

other confiscated ships followed suit, and a little trade was thus set

up, originating the idea of returning to their old homes as Oibo,

foreigners or civilized men. Between 1839 and 1842 some five hundred

Yoruban recaptives determined to form a colony. About two hundred and

sixty-five landed in three ships at Lagos, and suffered from the

rapacity of the chiefs, reaching Abeokuta with difficulty. Between two

hundred and three hundred entered _viâ_ Badagry, where, by the influence

of Yoe Wawu, the Popo ‘English chief,’[144] they were better received,

and made for the interior in parties of fifty and sixty. Mr. T. B.

Freeman, a coloured Wesleyan missionary from Cape Coast Castle, followed

them for spiritual refreshment on the 11th December, 1842, visited

Abeokuta, which he describes even then as double the size of Komasi, and

reported his journey in the ‘Missionary Register’ for 1843. He and the

other converts were hospitably and kindly treated by Shodeke the king,

who allowed them to stand before him, not to prostrate themselves like

his heathen subjects.

The movement was accelerated and intensified by the ill-fated Niger

expedition, commanded by Captain Trotter, R.N., whose principal, if not

sole success, was in persuading Obi, chief of Abo, the capital of the

extensive Ibo (Eboe) country that occupies the lands lying about the

head of the Delta, to sign the treaty for the suppression of the slave

trade. Obi’s example was followed by the Ata of Igarrah, who also claims

the city of Kakanda. On the return of the expedition it was decided that

a Mr. Townsend, one of the Church Missionary Society’s catechists,

should proceed to Yoruba, and select an eligible base for future

operations. He embarked on the 14th November, 1842, on board a condemned

slaver, which three negroes had purchased and freighted, for Badagry.

There he met Mr. Freeman, who, on his return from Abeokuta, gave a

favourable description of Shodeke. Mr. Townsend, accompanied by two

blacks, Andrew Wilhelm and John M‘Cormack, proceeded to the capital, and

after a satisfactory interview with the warrior-king, returned to Sierra

Leone. Andrew Wilhelm was again sent to Abeokuta, whilst Mr. Townsend

proceeded for ordination to England. It was then arranged that he should

at once revisit Abeokuta in company with the Rev. Mr. Gollmer, who had

been some years at Sierra Leone, and Mr. Crowther, who had lately been

‘crowned a minister,’ the first full-blooded negro who ever ‘wagged his

pow’ in a Church of England pulpit, and who had preached his first

sermon at Freetown in January, 1844.

The Rev. Mr. Townsend arrived at Sierra Leone in December, 1844,

accompanied by Messrs. Gollmer and Crowther, with their wives and

families, and sundry natives, catechists and interpreters, carpenters

and labourers. He landed at Badagry in January, 1845; but Shodeke was

dead, and the Ado war, which was then raging, delayed their advance:

finally, it was decided that Messrs. Townsend and Crowther should

proceed to Abeokuta, and that Mr. Gollmer should remain at Badagry. The

quarrels of Akitoye and Kosoko detained the whole party seventeen weary

months on the coast, until M. Domingo Martinez[145]—the well-known

slave-dealer of Porto Novo and Whydah—effected a peace, and enabled the

missionaries to proceed, despite the unwillingness of the Badagry people

to part with them. Messrs. Townsend and Crowther, with their wives, left

Badagry on the 27th July, 1846, and arriving safely at Abeokuta, were

entertained by one Osho Ligregere, and were welcomed by Okokenu, the

actual Alake.

Ake—the royal head-quarters, in which Shodeke had resided—was chosen for

the first settlement. Three acres were granted by the king, a shed was

erected, Mr. Townsend preached, Andrew Wilhelm translated, and the

chiefs, Ogubonna, the Balogun, and Somoye, the Ibashorun,

listened—curiously. The mission-house was built in December, 1846; in

1847, a church was opened; and the end of that year saw four preaching

sheds at Owu, Itoku, Ikijá, and Igbein, where Mr. Crowther settled

himself, about two miles from Ake.

In 1848, Mr. Townsend—leaving behind him Mr. J. C. Müller, who died in

1850—returned to England, bearing a letter and a country cloth, offered

by the Alake and his caboceers to Her Most Gracious Majesty. His

departure was the signal for an attempt at persecution, which, probably,

the converts had brought upon themselves.[146] The conservative movement

was directed by several chiefs, of whom Akigbogun—termed the ‘Pharaoh of

Igbon’—distinguished himself. At the bottom of the affair, however, were

the Ogboni lodges, who said that the converts were turning the world

upside down; and certain Sierra Leone renegades, who had relapsed into

heathenism and the slave export trade. The fetishmen, to whom the new

faith was foolishness, also feared the loss of many goats and fowls. But

the polytheist is a bad persecutor: there was a little shaking of roofs,

flogging, pinioning, and prohibiting visits to the church or to white

men. Enough was done to fill a chapter, headed Persecution; but all was

of the mildest, none of the ‘curious juice,’ except from the back, was

shed.

Meanwhile, the Earl of Chichester, President of the Church Missionary

Society, was authorized to communicate with the Alake, acknowledging his

present, and exhorting him to wean his people from illicit to lawful

commerce. This letter, accompanied by a gift of English and Arabic

Bibles, and a steel corn-mill, was conveyed by the Revs. Dr.

Hinderer—who was sent to study the Hausa language—and J. Smith, to

Abeokuta, in the spring of 1849. The Alake and the chiefs, highly

gratified, proposed a sacrifice to the presents, which was rejected. The

so-called persecution ended in 1849, when the continuance of the

‘sentimental squadron’ was determined on; and in the spring of the next

year Mr. Townsend, who plays the part of the ‘great Eltchee’ in these

lands, returned from England to Ake in March 1850. In the same year Mr.

Hinderer, accompanied by Mr. Phillips, an interpreter, visited the towns

of Igbara and Ishagga, and settled at Oshelle, about eight miles north-

east of Ake.[147] In January, 1851, Mr. Beecroft, H.M.’s Consul for the

Bight of Biafra, after a journey to Agbome, proceeded to Abeokuta, and

made a covenant with the chiefs to repress future persecution. The same

year saw Badagry burnt down and destroyed in a cut-throat affair, and

Lagos scotched by the British. In March the King Gezo, of Dahome,

determining to renew the scenes of Okeadon—where, it is said, 20,000

Otas were seized and sold—attacked Abeokuta, and suffered shameful

defeat; and in the autumn of the same eventful year of Grace, 1851,

Commander Forbes, R.N.—of ‘Sarah Forbes Bonetta’ celebrity—proceeded to

Abeokuta in state,[148] and concluded a treaty between H.M.’s Government

and the Alake and labourers.

Abeokuta, at the present time of writing (Nov. 1861), contains four

several sects—Wesleyans, Episcopalians, Northern States Baptists, and

Southern States Baptists—who have split upon the rock of slavery. There

is a total of twenty whites—viz., three merchants—Messrs. Wike, Hughes,

and Bergmeyer—eleven male missionaries, four women, and two children.

The Wesleyans have one of each sex. The Church Missionary Society has

six whites, including one woman at Ake, three men, one woman, and two

children at Ikijá, and none at Owu: their total, therefore, is eight

men, two women, and two children. The Baptists have two white men and

one woman.

I felt truly grieved at the sight of my poor pretty countrywomen at

Abeokuta, and anticipated but too correctly what, in many cases, has

since proved their sad fate. They looked like galvanized corpses, even

those who had left England but a few months before, radiant with

pleasure, bright with youth and beauty. It is a crying sin and a shame

to expose these tender beings to such rude, unworthy trials. But what

words of mine would avail? I could only leave with them my wishes, my

vain hopes that they may soon be restored to those homely decent lands,

which no Englishwoman—if the power of ukase were mine—should ever be

permitted to leave.

Seven deaths have occurred in this mission since 1846. Mr. and Mrs.

Dennard, Messrs. Lord, Field, Paley, and Carter, and Mrs. Buhler, occupy

‘God’s Acre,’ the fetid, grassy graveyard of Abeokuta. Besides which

there are numerous native converts. Some years ago the average of

European life on the coast of the Benin Bight was two years; and of 100

white children only one or two, even when removed to England, reached

the age of ten. At Abeokuta this state of things seems in a fair way to

be perpetuated. The least that could be done by the authorities at home

would be to allow every missionary, male and female, a full year’s

furlough after every two years spent in the African interior.

As has been seen, the missionary holds a peculiar position in these

lands. At home a carter, a blacksmith, or a cobbler, he comes out to

Africa—I use his own expressions—‘to found empires, and to create

nations.’ Whilst one Mr. T******* rings the bell for the ‘Western Times’

in the streets of Exeter, the other, a missionary, holds in his hand the

destinies of Abeokuta. Far from being a disparagement, it is highly

honourable, according to English ideas, for a man so to raise himself

above his caste; but how often ‘_honores mutant mores_,’ and what a

terribly bad politician from Indus to the Pole your reverend man mostly

is!

The Sierra Leone settlers are numbered at 2000. They have the name of

being prime disturbers of the public peace—especially those who have had

the misfortune to visit England—and they are openly accused of relapsing

into the lowest heathenism, and of slave-trading, under the specious

pretext of redeeming captives. Of course they deny the charge, and if by

any chance they speak the truth this time, they have been greatly

maligned. But of them more in a future page.

The number of converts registered is about 1500, the communicants may

amount to 800. The slave-trade, in its slow but sure reflux from the

west to the east, has done this much of good. The Mombas Mission in

Eastern Africa, where there are no re-captives, could, in the same

number of years, boast of but one convert, and he had been a maniac. As

might be expected, the stranger hears of shining lights amongst the Neo-

christians of Abeokuta, such as John Baptist Dasalu, Martha Dasalu, Mat.

Oluwalla, Mary Ije, and Susannah Kute. There is even a Christian

_Balogun_ or Caboceer, John Akirona, _i.e._ John the Great, and he is

favourably spoken of as an independent and honest man. The neophytes are

exposed to sore temptations. I have heard convert-women on the coast

declare that their native catechists are holy men, that to offend with

them is not the same as to sin with the laity; besides which, under such

circumstances, it is not their—the weaker vessel’s—‘palaver.’ In the

more degraded stages of the Roman Catholic religion the penitent thinks

the same of her confessor. Moreover, if I am rightly informed, convicts

are preferred for conversion, which must naturally lead to ‘breakings

out.’

The schools contain 265 children, who are crammed with hymn-singing,

reading, and other civilized arts. As an American missionary rightly

observes, the English language is held to be a second revelation to

mankind, and thus becomes a curse to the people. The natives should be

induced to found, and to support their own schools; and, until they

discover the value of education, it is perhaps better not to force their

minds.

As for the adults—chiefs and commons—of Abeokuta generally, there is in

their minds an ingrained idolatry, against which even the outburst of

missionary spirit, in the days of Cary and his contemporaries, would

prove futile. ‘At least thirteen apostles,’ as I heard a Scotchman say,

‘would be required for the people Egba.’ The power of the Ogboni is

unlimited; it extends from Abeokuta to Sierra Leone, where the ‘Akoo

companies’ form a complete _vehm gericht_, and no foreigner can expect

to swim against such a tide. This may explain the later failures of our

political relations with Abeokuta. And the Egba is stubborn, most

suspicious and hard to change when he has once adopted an idea; it is to

be feared that without main force—which we cannot apply—the Ogboni will

succeed in defeating all our best intentions.

[Footnote 130: Like the French Canadians, the people are gregarious, and

prefer for safety to live in cities and towns. Their farms and fields

show only small huts.]

[Footnote 131: These conjectures are all borrowed from Mr. Bowen, who

probably saw more of the country than any other white man.]

[Footnote 132: According to the Ethiopic Directory, Ichoo is the name of

the town of Lagos—a decided mistake.]

[Footnote 133: Mr. Bowen allows it 400 square miles, and 30,000 souls,

but he does not include Badagry and other provinces.]

[Footnote 134: Mr. Bowen gives 100,000, but he estimates Abeokuta at

80,000 only.]

[Footnote 135: Kakanda or Ibbodo, the capital of the Effon people, is a

large city on the right bank of the Kwara River.]

[Footnote 136: The Gambari, of old called Cumbrie, are the men of

Hausa—so termed from the Kambi—who live on the banks of the Niger above

Busa.]

[Footnote 137: The Kaniki are the people of Burnu, and the latter word

means a ship, the town having been built where Noah’s ark first touched

land. We have given the name of the city to the country. The Kaniki are

descended from Barba, _i.e._ Dar Borghú.]

[Footnote 138: See Appendix to Denham and Clapperton’s Travels.]

[Footnote 139: Igbo means a forest; Igboho, a noisy forest, a howling

wilderness; Oyo is derived from _yo_, to escape, and points to the first

city of refuge south of the Kwara.]

[Footnote 140: Missionaries naturally connect this ridiculous fable with

the Mosaic Creation and the equally apocryphal Noachian flood dove and

olive-branch. I extract the following from the Rev. Mr. Crowther’s

introductory remarks to the ‘Grammar and Vocabulary of the Yoruba

Language:’ ‘It is said by the Yorubans that fifteen persons were sent

from a certain region; and that a sixteenth, whose name was Okambi (an

only child), and who was afterwards made King of Yoruba, volunteered to

accompany them. The person who sent them out presented Okambi with a

small piece of black cloth, with something tied up in it; besides a

fowl, Tetu, a servant (slave), and a trumpeter,—Okinkin was the name of

the latter. On opening the gate of this unknown region, they observed a

large expanse of water before them, through which they were obliged to

wade. As they went on, the trumpeter reminded Okambi of the small piece

of cloth, by sounding the trumpet according to the instructions of the

person above mentioned. The cloth being opened, a palm-nut, which was

deposited in it with some earth, fell into the water. The nut grew

immediately into a tree, which had sixteen branches. As the travellers

were fatigued by long wading through water they were glad of this

unexpected relief, and soon climbed up and rested themselves on the

branches. When they had recruited their strength, they prepared again

for the journey, yet not without great perplexity, not knowing in what

direction they should proceed. In this situation, a certain person,

Okikisi, saw them from the region whence they set out, and reminded the

trumpeter of his duty; on which he sounded again, and thus reminded

Okambi of the small piece of black cloth, as before. On opening it some

earth dropped into the water, and became a small bank; when the fowl,

which was given to Okambi, flew upon it and scattered it, and wherever

the earth touched the water, it immediately dried up. Okambi then

descended from the palm-tree, allowing only his slave and his trumpeter

to come down with him. The other persons begged that they might be

allowed to come down; but he did not comply with their request until

they had promised to pay him, at certain times, a tax of two hundred

cowries each person.

‘Thus originated the kingdom of Yoruba, which was afterwards called Ife;

whence three brothers set out for a further discovery of better

countries. At their departure they left a slave, named Adimu (which

signifies ‘Holdfast’), to govern the country of Ife in their absence.

The tradition of the three brothers explains the relationship of the

three chieftains in the kingdom of Yoruba; namely, the chief Iketu,

called Alaketu, and said to be the eldest; the second, or Alake, chief

of the Egbas; and the King of Yoruba, the youngest, who however in

former days took tribute from the rest. There is a similar tradition

concerning the chiefs of Allada (Ardrah), Ijashe (Porto Novo), and

Dahome.

‘After the repulse of the Dahoman army in 1850, some of the prisoners

were presented to Oni, the Chief of Ife, to the Alaketu, and to the King

of Yoruba by the Abeokutans, in memory of their victory. He of Ife

returned a polite symbolical letter which was construed by the

missionaries as an invitation to come over into his country and to help

his people.’]

[Footnote 141: The early history of Yoruba is thus given by the Rev. Mr.

Crowther: ‘The Kings of Yoruba may be safely traced back to the time of

Ajagbo, who reigned in Oyo (Katanga), and died at a great age. The time

of his reign cannot now be ascertained. He was succeeded by Abiodun, who

also enjoyed a long and peaceful reign, and died an old man. The elders

of Yoruba always refer to his rule as a time of peculiar felicity, and

one which cannot again be expected for a long time. About this time the

Felutas (Fulas) were known only as shepherds and herdsmen. They were

permitted to feed their sheep and cattle wherever they liked, and

generally lodged outside the town in tents.

‘After the death of Abiodun, Arogangan, his brother, succeeded him.

Arogangan’s nephew, Afunja, born in Ilori, whose father was a brave

warrior, was made Are-obbo (King’s Chief Warrior), and was placed in

Ilori, the king thinking that Afunja would be satisfied with this high

post of honour; but instead of this, Afunja used every artifice that he

could think of to dethrone Arogangan, that he might possess the kingdom.

The king being aware of his designs, under pretence of offence given to

him by the people of Iwe-re, the town of Abiodun’s mother, sent Afunja

to war against it, making sure that by this means he should remove

Afunja out of the way; but the matter turned out the reverse. When

Afunja got to Iwe-re, he told them that he was sent by Arogangan to

fight against them. They were surprised at this declaration. Afunja was

sent back, and an army sent to demand Arogangan, and to fight against

Oyo in case of refusal to give him up. Oyo was besieged, and Arogangan,

dreading the consequences of falling into the hands of his enemies,

poisoned himself; upon which the army departed from Oyo. The beginning

of his reign may be supposed to be about the year 1800. He reigned seven

years’ [N.B.—This would place the beginning of the chronicle between

1720 and 1740].

‘Adebo succeeded his brother Arogangan. He was chosen by the Elders of

Oyo, in preference to Afunja, who might now have been placed on the

throne of Yoruba on account of his greatness of mind, but was refused

because of his treachery. Adebo reigned only one hundred and twenty

days. It is supposed that he was poisoned.

‘Maku, one of the royal family, a favourite of Afunja, succeeded Adebo;

but it appears that the majority of the inhabitants of Oyo were not well

pleased with him. There was war at Igboho; and Maku, accompanied by

Okpelle, one of the king’s counsellors, took the command; but being

unsuccessful in the undertaking, he chose rather to die than return

home; so he killed himself. He reigned only three months.

‘After Maku’s death it appears there was an interregnum of five years,

during which period affairs were conducted by one Ojo, who was

Obbashorun or privy counsellor. Majotu succeeded Maku, and reigned for

some time well; but his son did a great deal of mischief, chiefly by

kidnapping. The people complained bitterly against the prince; and at

last required him to be given up for trial. Majotu felt very uneasy on

account of his son’s behaviour, and life became such a misery to him

that he poisoned himself. It is not certain how long he reigned.

‘It is not uncommon among the Yorubas, under some injury, vexation, or

disappointment, to commit suicide, either by taking some poisonous

draught, sticking themselves with a poisoned arrow, or cutting their

throats or bellies with a sword or razor. Such are generally looked upon

as acts of bravery.

‘Amodo succeeded Majotu; about which time the country of Yoruba was in

great confusion.

‘Afunja, who was made chief warrior in the kingdom, took the opportunity

of the unsettled state of affairs at the capital to ingratiate himself

with the people of Ilori. He allowed them to make whatever use they

liked of their plunder in battle; taking nothing from them, either for

himself or for the king, and thus encouraged them to war. By this means,

such slaves as were not satisfied deserted their masters and joined

Afunja at Ilori; in doing which they were declared free and independent.

The Felutas, who had hitherto contented themselves with a pastoral life,

began now to distinguish themselves as great warriors; and as they

gained a firm footing in the country they introduced their religion—that

is, Mohammedanism. As Afunja could not get to the throne in any other

way, he tried to make himself friendly with the people of the capital,

and to get them into a quarrel with some principal head-men in Ilori,

who, it appears, began to be too strong for him. But they of Ilori,

being aware of his treacherous plans, caught him and burnt him publicly

in Ilori, and exposed his ashes for many days. After this, the people of

Ilori, being mostly Mohammedan, did not think it proper to be subject to

a pagan king, but became independent, and on this account the civil war

broke out which has almost desolated the kingdom of Yoruba. Since this

time, Ilori has become the rendezvous of the Mohammedan army.

‘The surviving princes who have a right to the throne of Yoruba in

succession, are Atiba, Tella, Afunja the younger, and Ajibekum. Atiba is

the present King of Yoruba. He removed the seat of government from Oyo

to Aggo-oja, where he is now using every means in his power to subdue

Ilori.’]

[Footnote 142: The Abeokutans, as will be seen, point out their old

seats northwards, around the present Ibadan.]

[Footnote 143: The Guinea niggers of the United States are the Fantis

and Popos. The good niggers are from Yoruba, Nupe, Hausa, and the Sudan

generally. The Bozals of Cuba are any wild blacks.]

[Footnote 144: Badagry, like Whydah, was divided in the old slaving days

into different towns, French, English, Portuguese, &c., and each had its

independent chief. In 1842 there was an English factory there, for

buying palm oil. All the other commerce was in the hands of the slave

traders. Kidnapping was common. The roads were unsafe to travel, and

farming could be carried on only within a short distance of the towns.]

[Footnote 145: Commander Forbes calls him, probably by a misprint,

Domingo Josè Martins.]

[Footnote 146: The proceedings of new converts in the old haunts of

idolatry may serve to throw no little light upon the causes of the great

persecutions under Nero, and other ‘enemies of the Church.’]

[Footnote 147: Since 1851, Mr. Hinderer, with an interval of sick leave

to England, has been settled at Ibadan. The chiefs of Abeokuta opposed

this measure strongly, and the country is now at war with Abeokuta: he

naturally takes the side of his protégés, and differs totally from his

colleagues in Egba-land upon the subject of the ‘mad dogs of Ibadan.’]

[Footnote 148: Commander Forbes was received with a formal cavalcade,

which was omitted in our case, a sign that familiarity with us was

breeding contempt for the white face.]

CHAPTER VI.

OUR SECOND VISIT TO THE KING.

The morning of Monday saw me on foot betimes. At 6 A.M. I again ascended

the Ake Hill, behind, or north of the Church Missionary compound, and

proceeded to take, with prismatic compass, bearings of Abeokuta, which

as yet has not been honoured with aught worthy the name of plan. My

first thought was to measure by gun-sound, _secundum artem_, a base

between Ake and Olumo. The timid English residents feared, however, lest

his potent majesty the Alake might take umbrage at the shooting, and

suspect sinister intentions.

The next motion was to meet the Akpesi or Prince of Eruwan, the second

dignitary in the town, who had called on Commander Bedingfield previous

to this day’s interview, for the purpose of communicating ideas of his

own. As at Komasi, and in Great Benin city, it is not ‘etiquette’ for

subjects to visit a stranger before the ceremony of presentation: that

over, however, they call singly and in mass.

The Akpesi is a tall, thin, wrinkled senior, very plain, close-shaved,

as usual, little ornamented, and poorly clad. He is one of the wise, who

never bring forth their best clothes till after death. His discourse was

sensible, and to the point. Amongst other things, he declared that

Abeokuta did not want this, showing the backs of both hands placed side

by side (hostility), nor this, one palm up and the other down (double-

face or deceit), but rather this, and this only, both palms up (a sign

of friendship). I took the opportunity of asking him if he could not

procure me admission into one of the Ogboni lodges. He replied—a great

man never says ‘No’—that it would require large fees. When the amount

was demanded, he named twenty-two bags of cowries, two sheep, and two

goats. As this did not seem to deter me he doubled the sheep and goats.

The sum being acceded to he declared that there was much death to be

seen in those places; and as this again failed, and he was driven into a

corner, he requested me to ‘let it go’ at present, but that on some

future occasion I should be satisfied. This was conclusive, but not

satisfactory. It is astonishing how much Asiatics and Africans make of

these mysteries, and how long it takes to fathom them. I was nearly five

years in India before a Brahmin could be induced to invest me with the

thread of the Twice Born; and my attempts to discover the secret of the

Jatawalla[149] were all in vain. My plans of sketching the interior of

an Ogboni lodge failed at Abeokuta, though Mr. Wilhelm, the catechist,

did his best: a week was not sufficient. The last answer was, that their

excellent friend Mr. Townsend had advised them never to admit a

European. At Ikoradu, however, my friend Mr. M‘Coskry and I, happening

to pass an Ogboni lodge, which was full of men and elders, quietly

walked in, and stepped round the building before the assembly, stupefied

by the sudden appearance of white faces, dropping as it were from the

skies, found presence of mind to protest.

Mr. Bowen translates Ogboni, ‘a sort of freemasonry, a respectable,

elderly man.’ It is neither one nor the other. Any naked boy, running

about the streets, may, when ten years old, if a free-born Egba, of good

repute—_integer vitæ scelerisque purus_—rise to this dignity. Nor is it

in any way connected with European freemasonry—a favourite comparison

with the uninitiated. Freemasonry, properly considered, is a faith _per

se_—holding the grand tenets—1st, Monotheism, or the belief in one God,

without which no man can become even an ‘entered apprentice;’ and 2ndly,

Brotherhood, or the mutual fellowship of man, in all conditions and

circumstances of life. It is evident that neither of these sublime ideas

are indigenous amongst the Egbas. The Alake is superior to the chief of

the Ogboni, and the others follow in their several degrees. They are

elected by the people, and, together with the war captains, they form a

council, whose powers are said to be unlimited. They rule during the

long interregnums, and at all times they manage the revenue and the

taxes. In emergencies they are assisted by companies of old and young

men, representing the masses. The Ogboni have proved a serious obstacle

to the progress of El Islam and Christianity, by their strict

surveillance over the juniors, and by the inquisition which they

exercise in the inner affairs of life. Consequently, some missionaries

object to converts belonging to it. I have already alluded to its

political influence.

The Ogboni lodge, which thus resembles the Muanza of East Africa, the

Purrah of the Susu Timni and Bulloms near Sierra Leone, and the

Endowment House of the City of the Saints, is found in every town.

Supported by the fees paid every seventeenth day by the members of the

lodge, it is a long, low building, only to be distinguished by the

absence of loungers, fronted by a deep and shady verandah, with stumpy

polygonal clay pillars and a single door, carefully closed. The panels

are adorned with iron alto-relievos of ultra-Egyptian form; snakes,

hawk-headed figures, and armed horsemen in full front, riding what are

intended to be horses in profile; the whole coloured red, black, and

yellow. The temples of Obatala are similarly decorated.[150] A

gentleman, who had an opportunity of overlooking the Ogboni lodge from

the Ake church steeple, described it to me as a hollow building with

three courts, of which the innermost, provided with a single door, was

that reserved for the elders, the holy of holies, like the Kadasta

Kadastan of the Abyssinians. He considered that the courts are intended

for the different degrees. The stranger must, however, be careful what

he believes concerning their mysteries. The Rev. Mr. Bowen asserts that

the initiated are compelled to ‘kneel down and drink a mixture of blood

and water from a hole in the earth.’ The Egbas deny this: moreover, they

charge Mr. Bowen with attempting to worm out their secrets for the

purpose of publication. As all are pledged to the deepest reticence, and

as it would be fatal to reveal any mystery—if any there be—we are hardly

likely to be troubled with over-information.

The Alake had summoned us to audience at the early hour of 10 A.M. We

went punctually, and were met at the door by Beri, his Majesty’s M.C.,

who informed us that his master was then unprepared, but would let us

know when visible. We left the palace not unamused by this second

attempt at, and success in, ‘doing dignity,’ and we sauntered about in

the shade outside. Two of the trees showed a peculiar fruit. One had a

brace of skulls with tenpenny nails through the forehead, and bits of

brown skin, like dry fig-peel, still sticking in patches to the half-

bleached bone. These had been women who, according to one account, had

been executed for attempting to poison their master, a native Christian

merchant; according to others they had been sold by the said Christian

merchant for sacrifice. Another tree showed seven of these relics: one

of them was almost mummified, and the lower jawbone was still attached

by remnants of cartilage. His Majesty the Alake—who had soon heard of

our visit to the place—afterwards informed us that four of these

belonged to Egbas who had been executed for kidnapping their friends and

allies the Ijaye. The Tyburn trees were distinguished by the clothes,

probably the attire of the dead, wrapped round the boles up to the

branches. I amused myself with sketching the blossoms that grew on those

boughs, and—the scene was quite Dantesque—I could not but wish that M.

Doré had been there to borrow from it certain details.