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Updated: June 12, 2025
I came trembling; she stripped and flogged me long and severely with the cow-skin; as long as she had strength to use the lash, for she did not give over till she was quite tired. When my master came home at night, she told him of my fault; and oh, frightful! how he fell a swearing. He kept his word Oh sad for me! I cannot easily forget it.
One of the cows had dragged the rope away from the stake to which Hetty had fastened it, and got loose. My master flew into a terrible passion, and ordered the poor creature to be stripped quite naked, notwithstanding her pregnancy, and to be tied up to a tree in the yard. He then flogged her as hard as he could lick, both with the whip and cow-skin, till she was all over streaming with blood.
This little disclosure in the history of Karague led us on to further particulars of Dagara's death and burial, when it transpired that the old king's body, after the fashion of his predecessors, was sewn up in a cow-skin, and placed in a boat floating on the lake, where it remained for three days, until decomposition set in and maggots were engendered, of which three were taken into the palace and given in charge to the heir-elect; but instead of remaining as they were, one worm was transformed into a lion, another into a leopard, and the third into a stick.
For the information of my readers, I must observe that a cow-skin is a large whip, made like a riding whip out of the hide of the hippopotamus, or sea-cow, and is proverbial for the severity of punishment it is capable of inflicting.
For you must know, by a curious process of reasoning, Robin and his men had hunted in the royal preserves so long that they had come to consider themselves joint owners to every animal which roamed therein. "Nay!" he added, "this must be looked into! That cow-skin cap in sooth must hide a scurvy varlet!"
A cow-skin was slung under the wagon for carrying wood and heavy cooking utensils, and the calf was given a berth in the hammock until he was able to follow. But when Bull became older he hung around the wagon like a dog, preferring the company of the outfit to that of his own mother. He soon learned to eat cold biscuit and corn-pone, and would hang around at meal-time, ready for the scraps.
My first impulse was to wrest the cow-skin from the negro's hand, and revenge the poor bleeding child as she lay motionless on the ground, but a moment's reflection convinced me that such a step would only have brought down a double weight of punishment on the victims when I was gone; so, catching up my hat, I turned away with disgust, and walked slowly towards the town and bay of Port Praya, reflecting as I went along what pleasant ideas the poor creatures must entertain of religion, when the name of God and of the cow-skin were invariably associated in their minds.
The unmerciful whip with which they are chastised is made of cow-skin, hardened, twisted, and tapering, which brings the blood with every blow, and leaves a scar on their naked back which they carry with them to their grave.
Outside his gate I found Mkuenda, who said the queen had sent him to invite "her son" to bring her some stomach medicine in the morning, and come to have a chat with her. With Mkuenda I walked home; but he was so awed by the splendour of my hut, with its few blankets and bit of chintz, that he would not even sit upon a cow-skin, but asked if any Waganda dared venture in there.
D has often stripped me naked, hung me up by the wrists, and beat me with the cow-skin, with his own hand, till my body was raw with gashes. Yet there was nothing very remarkable in this; for it might serve as a sample of the common usage of the slaves on that horrible island.
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