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Captain Burton speaks of this custom with the Dahome tribe Small gods of clay are made in priapic attitudes before which the natives worship. The god is often made as if contemplating its sexual organs. Another traveler, a clergyman, has described the same worship in this tribe. He has observed idols in priapic attitudes, rudely carved in wood, and others made of clay.
There is no greater insult to a man, than to point at him with two fingers, meaning that he is a twin; of course he is not one, or he would have been killed at birth. Albinos are allowed to live, as in Dahome, in Ashanti, and among some East African tribes, where I have been "chaffed" about a brother white, who proved to be an exceptional negro without pigmentum nigrum.
The so-called royal races in the eight great despotisms of Pagan Africa Ashanti, Dahome, and Benin; Karagwah, Uganda, and Unyoro; the Mwata ya Nvo, and the Mwata Cazembe allow the greatest liberty even to the king's sisters; they are expected only to choose handsome lovers, that the race may maintain its physical superiority; and hence, doubtless, the stalwart forms and the good looks remarked by every traveller.
Ahin Blay dismounted with ceremony, and was as ceremoniously received. His features are those of the Fanti, somewhat darker than usual, and his expression is kindly and intelligent: though barely fifty-five his head is frosty and his goatee is snowy. The visit was a state affair, a copy in small of Ashanti and Dahome.
On the other hand, the conduct of the women was admirable; as the conqueror said in the Mansion House, he hardly wondered at the King of Dahome keeping up a corps of 'Amazons. I shall presently return to the gold-mines. At Lagos M. Colonna, Consular Agent for France, informs me that by his firm alone 600 hands are wanted for field-service, and that the number might rise to a thousand.
Wet and weary we reached Banana Point on Sunday, Sept. 27, 1863, fortunately not too "late for the mail," and, next day, I was on board "Griffon," ready for Dahome and for my late host King Gelele. The Slaver and the Missionary in the Congo River. In the preceding pages some details have been given concerning domestic slavery upon the Congo River.
On the 24th Sept. a letter from the Commodore of the station informed me that I had been appointed H. M.'s Commissioner to Dahome, and that, unless I could at once sail in H.M.S. "Griffon," no other opportunity would be found for some time. The only step left was to apply for a canoe, and, after a kindly farewell to my excellent host, I left Boma on the evening of Sept. 25.
The ceremony is more elaborate than the "wallowings" and dust- shovellings described by Ibn Batuta at the Asiatic courts, by Jobson at Tenda,by Chapperton at Oyo,by Denham amongst the Mesgows, and by travellers to Dahome and to the Cazembe. Yet the system is virtually the same in these distant kingdoms, which do not know one another's names.
Cariambemba is, properly, Kadi Mpemba or Ntangwa, the being that slays mankind: Merolla describes it as an "abominable idol;" and the word is also applied to the owl, here as in Dahome the object of superstition. Thus, "Simbi" presides over villages and the "Tadi Nzazhi," or Lightning Rock, near Boma; whilst the Yellala is the abode of an evil being which must be propitiated by offerings.
For the rude African form see my Mission to Dahome, i. 332, and for that of Darfour, pp. 360-69 of Shaykh Mohammed's Voyage before quoted. "Siwak"=a tooth-stick; "Siwa-ka"=lit. other than thou. "Arak"=tooth stick of the wild caper-tree; "Ara-ka" lit.=I see thee. In India many other woods are used, date-tree, Salvadora, Achyrantes, phyllanthus, etc. Hence Koran, chaps. xcv. 1.
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