XITHE FANG
During my second and much longer term in Africa I lived at Baraka, a mission station two miles south of Libreville, in the Congo Français, on the great estuary of the Gaboon River, or, thebay, as I always called it. The coast tribe of the Gaboon is called theMpongwe. But my work was almost entirely with the interior tribe—theFang.
The Fang is probably the largest of all the tribes of West Africa. The Bulu of the Cameroon interior are a branch of the Fang, and there are several other branches. They occupy the interior of Cameroon and the Congo Français, extending north and south behind at least twelve coast tribes occupying three hundred miles of coast. M. de Brazza after extended travel among the Fang estimated that there were more than ten millions, and perhaps fifteen millions of them; but I think it unlikely that further knowledge will confirm this calculation. M. de Brazza is usually a most reliable authority; but he probably travelled through the more densely populated parts of the Fang territory.
Since most of my work was done among the Fang, along the Gaboon River, they are the tribe that I know best. I am very partial to them, and therefore, before going further I must say a word in regard to the pronunciation of this word, “Fang,” and beg the reader not to speak of them as if they were a generation of vipers. The name is not pronounced in the least like our word“fang,” and indeed the vowel sound in the latter word is unknown in the African dialects; the sound of the letter “a” is like that in the word “father.”
The whole Fang tribe has been moving towards the coast for many years, and they have already emerged at several points, notably Gaboon. Dr. Leighton Wilson, writing about 1860, speaks of them as having just appeared west of the Sierra del Crystal Mountains, one hundred miles east of the Gaboon Coast. Dr. Wilson, who had a more extended knowledge of the coast than any man of his time, speaks of the Fang as the most remarkable and most forceful people he had met in West Africa. They now have villages among the Mpongwe, and along the entire length of the Gaboon River and the tributaries of the river and estuary. This for years was my mission field, a territory one hundred and twenty miles east and west, and fifty miles north and south. The entire area is a network of waterways, which are also the highways; for there are very few bush-roads, and they are of the worst kind. I know of no more attractive field in West Africa. It combines the far more comfortable home of the coast, and the more hopeful work of the interior. By the use of a launch, or even a sailboat, the towns on the watercourses are easily and quickly accessible.
Thus, also, it allows for expansion and concentration of influence in their proper relation. Instead of the influence of the missionary being concentrated in an immediate community where he becomes practically a pastor, in such a field as that of the Gaboon watercourses he is rather as a bishop among native pastors, and influential in many communities. For the native, however meagre his education, if he be otherwise worthy, is always a better pastor than the foreigner, and needs only counsel. The church also is likely to be more independent in spirit, and resourceful. In a single communitywhere the white missionary is ever present, Christianity shares his prestige, and a few leaders being converted, the movement becomes popular, and many follow without deep convictions or earnest purpose. But in a community with which no white man is identified Christianity cannot acquire an artificial popularity; converts are earnest,—are leaders, not followers, and each group becomes the centre of a strong influence, exerted in service from the beginning, and the nucleus of a native church.
At the same time there may be a proper concentration of influence in boarding-schools and classes for religious training, and especially in a seminary for the training of catechists and ministers. This withal approaches most nearly to the method of our Master, who preached to multitudes in various places widely separated, the while He concentrated His influence in the training of the twelve. He who of all men might have dispensed with methods, was really a master of methods.
Before my time the only work of our mission among the Fang was at Angom Station, on the upper river, seventy miles above Baraka; but the work though faithfully done had been restricted to one town, which was a small factor in the great field that I have described, which larger field had never been opened to missionary work. When our missionary at Angom died, and his successor after a short period withdrew, the station was abandoned; and the little church not yet established in the faith, unable to stand alone, soon collapsed. A few years later, in 1902, when little remained but the name, the Angom church was formally dissolved by the Corisco Presbytery.
I have written at some length of the Bulu of the interior. The Fang of the interior, at the head waters of the Gaboon, are like the Bulu, while some of those at the coast are quite civilized.
The Fang village in this territory is built close to the river or stream. The population of a village varies from fifty to three hundred; the average population is probably not more than a hundred persons. Those of the same village are closely related, usually brothers or first cousins, and their wives and children, with the elders, or grandfathers. They regard themselves as one family, and all the children of the village as brothers and sisters. Under no circumstances would they intermarry. The child addresses ever so many men as “Father,” and ever so many women as “Mother.” Parental authority is not exclusive; the whole town has more or less to say in the control and discipline of each child. The result is that while a score of parents are adding zest to existence in a fine squabble as to whether the child shall sit here, or there, shall do this, or that, the child, heedless of conflicting orders, does as he likes and goes where he pleases. Yet, one finds, as he knows them better, that the real parents are always distinguished and exercise the final authority.
The village consists of a single street running away from the river, though sometimes there is a second street, at right angles with the first, and occasionally even a third. On either side of the street the houses are built in straight rows, close together, and almost exactly the same. Among the Bulu the houses are detached; but among the Fang they are under one continuous roof. This arrangement is convenient for an enemy in time of war. For, to set fire to the first house is to burn the whole town; and nothing could burn more rapidly than dry thatch. Nearer the coast the enemy will often saturate the end of the first roof with kerosene—it is the only use they make of kerosene. Across each end of the street is a “palaver-house,” which is the public place, where the men spend most of the day in talking, eating, sleeping and quarrelling. This is theclub-houseof the men,and the women enter it only on privilege. A missionary entering a town will nearly always be sure of an audience in the palaver-house.
The houses have bark walls held by horizontal strips of bamboo tied with rope of vine, and supported by upright poles two feet apart, which are sharpened at the lower end and stuck in the ground. The roof is of palm thatch, and there is no floor. Not a nail is used in the entire construction of the house. Nearer the coast, bark is not used for walls. They are made of split bamboo, attached horizontally to upright poles.
The interior is a single room with beds around the walls. The bed consists of straight round poles laid lengthwise upon two cross-poles, the head being supported by a wooden pillow. Upon these beds the natives sleep with nothing under them and nothing over them. But they usually keep a fire at night, which is made on the earth floor. There is no outlet for the smoke, but it escapes through a narrow open space between the walls and the roof. The door is tight closed at night, and often a family will enjoy themselves around a smouldering fire in smoke so dense that a white man could scarcely enter.
Their houses are kept as clean inside as their construction allows. But they are always in a state of disorder. The native mind has no categories. The native’s knowledge consists of isolated facts which he feels no mental compulsion to classify; neither do the women take pleasure in household order; and the notion of each article having a regular and proper place is foreign to their minds. However civilized they may become in the future, I can hardly think that the teapot under the bed or the pig in the parlour would ever offend their sense of propriety.
In the middle of the front wall is a rectangular hole,that looks like a window, but it is both door and window. At night it is closed by propping a piece of bark against it. The successful entrance of this door is a gymnastic feat requiring long practice for its performance, and we can afford to watch the white man’s first attempt. He has seen the black man pass through it so easily that he does not suspect any difficulty. Approaching with assurance he lifts one leg quite high and passes it over the sill, only to find that he cannot get his head in; for not only is the door very low but the ragged thatch eaves of the roof project immediately in front of it. In the attempt his helmet, striking the eaves, rolls into the street. He goes after the helmet, brushes off some of the dirt, and approaching a second time, though with less assurance, he puts the other leg through the door, which is no improvement whatever upon the first effort, and he loses his helmet again. A third time he essays to enter, but with a step that indicates a rise of temperature. He thrusts his head and shoulders through the door, then tries to bring a foot in after him; but, invariably failing to get his foot nearly high enough to pass the sill he trips, falls forward, and goes plunging into the house sprawling on all fours, and only by extraordinary exertion escapes the fire in the middle of the room. The children, if they are not accustomed to the white man, scream with fright, and the grown people laugh without restraint. Those in the street laugh still louder and afford every evidence that the rear view of the performance—the unintelligible exertions, the sudden disappearance and the feet lingering on the door-sill—was an entertainment which they would greatly enjoy a second time. The white man gets up out of the dust and the ashes, glares fiercely around and asks if anybody knows where his helmet is. Some time in the future, after an extended and distressing experience he may chance to observe exactly how the black man entershis small door. He neither halts nor hesitates; but throwing up one leg, he throws his head down at the same time, probably extending an arm in front of him, and thrusting both head and leg through together, he bolts into the house. Near the coast the houses are better. There are often several rooms in a house. They have doors that swing on hinges, and windows the same, but unglazed. They have grass mats upon the beds. But all this is the result of the imported civilization.
The idle life of the Fang, especially in the interior, and his freedom from responsibility, seem to the impatient white man to have obliterated from his mind the idea of time. The more prosperous people near the coast have a passion for clocks, but it is because they like to hear them tick and strike. A Fang cannot conceive that he has wronged you if he comes several days late to keep an engagement. This unreliableness in everything where time is a factor is one of the chief trials of the white man in Africa. But he ought to regard the native’s viewpoint and consider how very irritating and really discouraging to the native must be the white man’s incessant hurry. “We are not in a hurry,” says the black man. “Why should you come to Africa to set us all hurrying? Has it made your own people so very happy that you want to share with us the blessing of haste?”
The African is the most sociable man in the world. He could not easily be killed with work even the hardest: he is not much afraid of it. But isolate him, take him away from his people, and he could easily die of homesickness. He is strongly emotional and warmly affectionate by nature. He loves his children, and sometimes embraces them tenderly, but he never kisses them. The kiss is meaningless to the African. They have never seen any such thing except between white people. I am almost ashamed to tell their interpretation of it as someof them have seen it executed and have reported to their people; but I presume it will do no harm. They think that white people, in kissing, expectorate into each other’s mouths. The word by which they designate the kiss is a compound which means “to exchange saliva.”—No wonder it is not popular! When those at the coast begin the practice of this fine art, it is usually accompanied by a sound loud enough to start a team of horses.
All their spare time they sit in the palaver-house and talk, stopping for an occasional nap. The old men as they sit scratching themselves with the itch relate wonderful tales and tell infinite lies about their achievements when young, how many women eloped with them, how many enemies they had killed in war, and how they had fought wild animals with unheard-of bravery. But they turn out interesting tales and are always listened to respectfully because of their years.
The chief factor in the social life is the marriage customs and the relations of husband and wife. The woman is regarded as inferior in every way to the man. It would be disgraceful to a man to be caught eating with his wife. Her duty is to work for him and to provide for him. She is bought with a price and is a part of his wealth; indeed, a man’s wealth and influence are measured by the number of his wives. The son inherits the father’s wives, all but his own mother. Frequently in the forest one may see a woman staggering along the rough bush-path under a load of forty or fifty pounds, and perhaps carrying her poor babe in a strap hung at her side, while her lordly husband walks before her with only his gun or a knife. In some tribes a wife must keep a certain distance behind her husband as they walk. If he should fall she must also fall, lest she laugh at him.
MAN AND WIFE.The woman always carries the load.
MAN AND WIFE.The woman always carries the load.
MAN AND WIFE.
The woman always carries the load.
TWO MEN DANCING.The music, supplied by various drums, may have charms to soothe the savage breasts; it certainly would soothe no other kind.
TWO MEN DANCING.The music, supplied by various drums, may have charms to soothe the savage breasts; it certainly would soothe no other kind.
TWO MEN DANCING.
The music, supplied by various drums, may have charms to soothe the savage breasts; it certainly would soothe no other kind.
A man and his wife once came to me from a distant town, the woman carrying a load of food which theywished to sell, the man carrying nothing. I told them that I had no use for the food and could not buy it; whereupon the man appealed to my pity and urged that the poor woman, who was exhausted, and who was suffering with an ulcer on her foot, was not able to carry the load back home. I replied that I knew how to relieve her, and I asked them both to turn their backs and close their eyes. They did as I asked, probably expecting that I would perform some miracle that would make the burden light. But, taking the burden from the woman’s back, I suddenly put it upon the man, and threw the strap over his shoulder. He flung it upon the ground with an angry protest at the great indignity I had put upon him in the presence of his wife.
Inconsistent with this is his love of his mother, of which I have spoken before; but it may be mentioned again, for it is the strongest sentiment and the deepest emotion in the mind and heart of the African. He always loves his mother more than his wife. The wife is also expected to love the members of her own family more than her husband; but the love of mother is strongest in the men. She is the one who will defend him against the machinations of his wives and be true to him when all others combine to denounce or to injure him. One day on an English steamer a traveller who was standing on deck and teasing some Kruboys in a boat below remarked to an Old Coaster how very good-natured they were. The Old Coaster told him something to say to one of them that involved a reflection on his mother. The traveller made the remark and was startled and somewhat frightened when the “good-natured” Kruboy turned upon him in a rage, cursed him and threatened to kill him. If he had been ashore he might have paid the penalty with his life. The African, old and young, thinks he has fully justified any violent assault upon another when he says: “Hecursed my mother.” Any reflection whether it be more or less serious is called a “curse.”
A man also loves his children more than his wife. Often the head-wife is the one who bears the most children. Children are not weaned until the age of three years or thereabouts. During all this period of lactation the husband and wife observe absolute continence in regard to each other, though not necessarily in regard to others.
A man has as many wives as he can afford to buy. The idea of marrying “just for love” is laughable. Such an act is sometimes cited as indicating weakness of character. Marriages of “strong-minded” men are controlled by expediency and convenience. In the territory of the Gaboon I know of no man that has more than ten wives; but in the farther interior some chiefs have half a hundred. Yet, though the possession of many wives is the ambition of every man, most of them never possess more than one. The dowry which a man pays for a wife is enormous; and none but the most successful traders are able to earn the amount. A dowry is often kept intact and passed from father to son, doing repeated service. A man may also procure a dowry by the sale of a sister. I have heard Fang boys boasting that they were rich because they had several sisters.
For those who are not so fortunate as to inherit a dowry or to have a sister, there are two alternatives; first they may remain unmarried, with the result that they will be regarded as contemptibly poor, and will be engaged in endless palavers with all the husbands of the town; or, they may boldly steal a woman of some other town, which will cause war between the two towns, and in the end, after several or many persons have been killed, the whole town will have to pay the dowry. Sometimes a man may have an incomplete dowry and may by working earn sufficient to complete it. The following would be an ordinarydowry among the Fang living near the coast: Ten goats, five sheep, five guns, twenty trade-boxes (plain wooden chests), one hundred heads of tobacco, ten hats, ten looking-glasses, five blankets, five pairs of trousers, two dozen plates, fifty dollars’ worth of calico, fifty dollars’ worth of rum, one chair and one cat. In addition to the above he must make frequent presents to his wife’s relations, who may be expected to arrive at any time and in any number for an indefinite visit. If there is any hatred in the heart of the African man it is usually directed towards his wife’s relations. A man is all his lifetime subject to bondage by reason of his wife.
A certain fellow missionary was married to another missionary. Some of the African boys, knowing that the white man had paid no dowry, expressed envious regrets at the ease with which a white man marries a wife. “All you white men have to do,” they said, “is simply to ask a woman; and the whole palaver is finished.” This also made my celibacy the more incomprehensible.
When a wife dies without having borne children the husband has the right to insist that the dowry be returned. A part of it and sometimes all of it will have been spent, and the people are reluctant to make up the loss; so the request that the dowry be returned after the death of a wife nearly always leads to war, though they do not question the right of the custom. If the wife runs away either to her own or another town, the dowry paid for her must be returned, if the woman is not sent back. In nearly every case her people will find it more convenient to send her back than to restore the dowry; so their bad passions of greed and immorality are balanced the one against the other, and the large dowry serves the purpose of keeping husband and wife together. But if the woman runs away not to her own town, but to some other town, eloping with another man, her people will often prevent warbetween the two towns by inducing her to return. Otherwise they themselves will become involved in the war. Nearly all the wars between different communities of the same tribe begin with a “woman-palaver.”
A woman after an attempt to run away, or upon being brought back, is usually put in stocks until she becomes submissive. Her foot is passed through a hole in a heavy block of wood about four feet long, the hole then being closed by a bolt. She is kept thus night and day. The irritation of the rough wood often produces a very bad ulcer. A woman in stocks is a common sight in the Fang towns. One day while I was in a Fang town on the river, I heard a woman crying in the next town as if in great pain. I asked an explanation and said I must go and see what was the matter. Some men of her town being present tried to persuade me not to go by telling a variety of conflicting lies that made me suspicious. I went to the town, and found in the palaver-house a withered old savage punishing his young wife by putting her hand in a large and heavy block, with the help of his younger brothers. He had made a small hole in the block and was dragging her hand through it. The hole was so small that he thought she would not be able to get her hand out, and it would not require the usual bolt. The hand was about one-third of the way through the hole and was already badly bruised. I knew the Fang towns, and just how far I could safely venture to use force in each, for they differ widely. The individual counts for nothing; everything depends upon the feeling or attitude of the whole town towards the white man. The sight of the woman and her crying were unbearable; I ordered the old chief to withdraw her hand immediately. He knew just how to do it and I did not. He began to argue, but I said: “Argument afterwards: remove her hand instantly.” Still he talked, and the woman cried. But amoment later my hand clutched his throat and he found himself pinioned against the opposite wall. Thereupon he indicated his readiness to comply with my request. He dragged her hand out of the block; the women of the town, all assembled, led her away as they moaned pathetically in sympathy, the woman herself still crying. A little later I followed them into the house and found them pouring warm water over the bruised hand to soothe the pain; but the woman still cried.
Meantime, the old man told me the story. It was typical of the extreme injustice often committed against the African woman: A young woman married against her will to a very old man, with the inevitable consequence that she despised him and cared too much for somebody else. I made the incident the text of my sermon and preached an up-to-date sermon onWoman’s Rights.
The old man’s cupidity, always alert, suggested a happy expedient. In a suave manner he deliberately proposed that since I knew so well how to treat a woman, he would as a favour accept a proper dowry from me, renounce his claim upon her and let me marry her. But I exclaimed, at least to myself: “This is so sudden!”
But would not the old man immediately carry out his purpose when I had left the town? No, he would not. An unexpected interruption in the performance of such an act he would regard as a sign that the act would be attended by misfortune to himself, and he would not repeat it. And that particular act, if he had repeated it, would certainly have been attended by misfortune; inflicted not by any invisible power, but by a white man. For, having undertaken to prevent the wrong, if I should afterwards allow it, I would lose influence and be despised in that town. But lest the reader should think of me as a very warlike individual, with a Bible in one hand anda big stick in the other, I hasten to say that, except in self-defense, I have only three times, in more than twice so many years, laid violent hands upon a native; and all three times the outrageous treatment of a woman was the occasion.
Less dowry is paid for a child than for “a whole woman,” as the Fang would say. A man frequently pays the dowry for a very young girl, who is then taken to his town and given in charge to his mother to raise, and the mother will probably “raise” her very early in the morning. She trains the girl for her son, and at a proper age delivers his wife to him. Children are often betrothed to each other, the boy’s father paying the dowry to the girl’s father, the children of course having nothing to say in the matter. I am inclined to think that these latter are the happiest marriages in Africa. A man once came to Efulen in great distress saying that his little daughter, a mere baby, was very ill and that if we did not help her she would surely die and, he added, the worst of it was that she was betrothed and he had received a portion of the dowry which he would be obliged to return if she should die. His grief was truly pitiable. I have known instances where a child was betrothed before it was born, the dowry to be kept intact and returned in case the child should not be a girl.
One Sunday I walked to an inland town two hours behind Baraka, where I found the people engaged in talking a dowry-palaver. I had to wait until this was finished before I could get a hearing. The occasion of the palaver was briefly this: Some years ago, in another town, there were two brothers whose father died leaving them their sister as an inheritance. A husband was found for this sister who paid a handsome dowry. The elder brother appropriated the dowry and took to himself a wife. Several years passed; the younger brotherwas grown to manhood, and he too desired a wife but had no dowry with which to procure her. He demanded from his brother his rightful share of his sister’s dowry. The dowry of course was gone; but the elder brother now had a daughter five years old, and it was proposed that he should find a husband for this child, thus procuring a dowry with which to settle with his younger brother. The trouble between the brothers became serious; and the people, wishing to avoid war, induced them to ask a certain neighbouring chief, who had a reputation for wisdom and diplomacy, to arbitrate between them and decide the matter.
This was the palaver that was in progress when I entered the town on Sunday, and I heard the closing speeches and the decision of the judge, which was as follows: “I will cut the palaver thus: The elder brother must dispose of his daughter as speedily as possible, and pay to his younger brother the sum of the dowry. Meanwhile, to procure obedience to this, the elder brother’s wife will remain in this town as my wife until the dowry is paid.”
This amicable arrangement was agreed to by all the parties concerned.
This chief deserved his reputation for cleverness. A few weeks later I was passing through his town when he called after me and asked if I were going to pass by without making him a little present of some tobacco in recognition of our intimate friendship.
In reply I asked: “Why do you not rather complain that I pass your town without stopping to tell you God’s Word? Is tobacco more important?”
His sprightly answer, delivered with perfect simplicity, was, “No doubt God’s Word is more important; but tobacco also is God’s gift, and I am very grateful to Him for it.”
Some of their immoral customs one can only mention with reserve even in writing. It is always regarded as amiable, and is sometimes required, that a host should give his wife to a guest. The wife is not consulted. Yet, if the guest, being a Christian, should refuse to comply with this custom, the woman, regarding herself as repulsed, will become enraged and vow vengeance upon the visitor; it will be positively dangerous for him to eat food in that town lest she poison him. It is common also for a man afflicted with a long illness to ask a friend to assume his marital relations until his recovery.
In one instance this request was made of a Christian man by an intimate friend, and at the woman’s suggestion. The man in his distress appealed to me to talk the palaver with the sick man. If a man has many wives, it is regarded as magnanimous for him to take but little notice of social wrong-doing; and the result is boundless immorality.
Charges of adultery are often made for the purpose of extortion. For this same purpose husbands and wives together often conspire against another person.
Polygamy is the greatest obstacle to the introduction of Christianity. It is not identical with the question of African sensuality; but involves a man’s wealth, influence and reputation, all of which depend upon the number of his wives. It is the very foundation of the whole structure of African society and is as firmly rooted as their Cameroon Mountain in the African soil. Critics of missions say that the obstacle is insuperable. But we believe in a Power that can say to the mountain: “Be thou removed; and be thou cast into the sea.” And that same Power is actually removing polygamy to-day. Moreover, the critics do not seem to see or do not understand that if polygamy be an insuperable obstacle to Christianity it is also an insuperable obstacle to civilization,which they advocate. The renouncing of polygamy and putting away his wives with all the loss that it involves serves as a final test of the African’s sincerity in professing the Christian faith. The man of the parable said: “I have married a wife, and therefore I cannot come.” When at the close of a service in a native town I gave a similar invitation a man replied with a sorrowful shake of his head: “I have marriedfivewives, and cannot come.”
In the later chapters of this book I shall tell of men who, notwithstanding the jeers and contempt of the people, have put away many wives and have come.
Among the real negro tribes of the Soudan (for the tribes of Central and Southern Africa are not pure negroes) there is a central government and a general organization. But there is no tribal organization among the Fang or any other tribe south of the Calabar River. The village, or a group of villages close together and immediately related, is the unit and the entirety of organization; although a common language is a bond of sympathy and they might freely unite against a common foe. Their government is nearly patriarchal in form. There is a headman in each village who is usually advanced in years. But unless he has many more wives than any other man he takes counsel in all matters with the elders of the town; and there are many public discussions in which all the men have a right to advise. There is no despotism, except the despotism of custom which no chief would challenge.
The right hand of the government is a secret society of the men, usually calledThe Gorilla Society, or sometimesThe Leopard Society. This or some corresponding society is found in all the tribes of West Africa, though there are details of difference even between the communities of the same tribe. The head of the society is not supposed to be aman, but a gorilla. They all know that this is not true but they have agreed to impose this lie upon each other and no one would dare say that the head of the society is a man. This man, or gorilla, is a witch-doctor and has great knowledge of witchcraft and all the occult arts. When a person dies the gorilla can tell whether he has been a victim of witchcraft, and he has means of discovering the witch. In order to realize the power of this man and the society one need only remember that nearly every death in Africa is imputed to witchcraft. His knowledge, however, is not regarded as absolute. He designates certain persons whom he professes to see in a vision, and they are then tried by ordeal.
It would be impossible to exaggerate the African terror of witchcraft. When it is announced that a certain deceased person has died of witchcraft, a panic ensues. They run back and forth in the street with wild, staring eyes, uttering imprecations and demanding blood.
The common ordeal is to drink some poisonous concoction and if it does not produce vertigo the accused is adjudged innocent; but if he staggers or falls he is guilty, and the people, all standing around and looking on with spears and swords in their hands, immediately rush upon him and kill him, usually cutting the body to pieces. Far more women than men die this death.
Among the Fang this society represents the worship of ancestors. The motive of the worship is not devotion to their ancestors but rather that they may procure their help in every undertaking, good and bad. Each man as directed by the head of the society secures the skull of a father or uncle recently deceased and after various ceremonies, of which I shall speak when I describe the native religion, he puts the skull in a box made for the purpose. No woman may see the contents of the box, nor is she supposed to know what it contains. If she should see theskull she will die. And she really does die, if it be known that she has seen it. She is doubtless poisoned by the society. The spirit of the ancestor, if the skull is well treated, will punish with sickness or death a disobedient or false wife, or any other enemy. This it is supposed will in some degree restrain disobedience on the part of wives and secure justice and honesty between men. Thus it serves the purpose of government. Where the power of the ancestor is the efficient agent rather than the supernatural power of the head of the society, the latter has less prominence and often does not profess to be more than a man. But where he is regarded as a gorilla, or spirit, no woman or child or uninitiated man may see him and live. Therefore as he approaches a town he gives warning by roaring like a gorilla. The women and children flee for their lives. Or, if unable to escape, they fall upon the ground and shut their eyes, mothers also putting their hands over their babies’ eyes, until the gorilla passes out of the town, after having helped himself to chickens, bananas or anything that he desires.
The African, it is said, loves idleness, amusement and war; of these three he probably loves war most.
Except in the vicinity of the foreign governments or the missions, war is the usual condition; not only between tribe and tribe but between village and village. Beyond the range of civilization there is no salutation between persons casually meeting and no need of it; a man hearing another approaching in the forest would hide.
Nsama, which means a crowd, is also the word for chance, or opportunity; because a man does not go anywhere alone and a crowd is his opportunity. Of course villages are often on friendly terms and some may manage to remain so; but in such cases there are usually strong reasons of expediency.
The usual beginning of a war is the stealing of a woman,as I have said; but this does not always lead to war and the shedding of blood. Nearer the coast milder measures of retaliation are often preferred, and when a woman is stolen the offended town will capture one of the other side and keep him prisoner until the woman is returned. The solidarity of the village in the native mind is impressed upon one continually. They also capture persons of a village in which some one owes them a dowry which he is reluctant to pay. In all such matters the whole village is held responsible for each one of its inhabitants. Many a time, travelling on the river, I have been about to call at a town when one of my crew in alarm has told me that there was a palaver between that town and his town and he dare not enter there. At the next town another one of the crew may raise the same objection; and another at the next. After a thorough trial I had to depend almost entirely on men of the coast rather than the Fang, for at least the first two years. It was not a cowardly imagination on the part of my Fang crew; they were in real danger.
On one occasion one of my Fang boys, Ndong Koni, my best helper and most devoted friend, accompanied me to a certain Fang town with which his people had a palaver. He had not a vestige of fear in him and he told me nothing about it, but depended upon my presence for his safety. When I was about to hold a service in the street I observed that the people were muttering in anger, and at last there was an outburst of wrath which, as I saw in a moment, was directed against Ndong Koni. A “sister” of Ndong Koni, who as a matter of fact was not nearer than a second cousin, having married a man in this town, had recently run away from a brutal husband, and her people had not yet made her return, or, unwilling to send her back, had not yet returned the dowry. The proposition was to seize Ndong Koni and put him instocks until the palaver should be settled. Once they should lay hands upon him nothing could be done to restrain them; for when degraded and ignorant people have committed one hostile act they become excited and violent; they are then a mob. I hurried to Ndong Koni’s side and with him I stepped back from the crowd while I addressed them and presented various arguments.
NDONG KONI.The first, the most faithful and the bravest of all my African friends.
NDONG KONI.The first, the most faithful and the bravest of all my African friends.
NDONG KONI.
The first, the most faithful and the bravest of all my African friends.
I said first: “Ndong Koni while in my service does not belong to his town, but to me; he is my son, and you have no palaver with me. Now suppose that one of your own young men should work for me—and I see several fine-looking young men here with strong arms to pull an oar. Suppose that a young man of your town should go with me to Alum, where you have a palaver, and that the people of Alum should attempt to seize him, what would you like to have me do? Shall I say: ‘He is only a black boy and I am a white man; I don’t care what you do with him.’ Or shall I say: ‘The colour of the skin makes no difference, so long as the blood is red. This boy while he works for me is my son; and if you should harm a white man’s son you will have a palaver with me and with the white governor at Libreville who owns the gunboat.’ Now what would you like me to say if one of these young men should go with me to Alum and the people should want to put him in stocks?”
They shouted in reply: “We would want you to say he was your son. Those are good words. You are the father of us all.”
“Yes,” said I, “I have many, many children; but my life is full of trouble, for they do not obey me.”
The chief and a few others were as hostile as ever, but there was a marked change in the attitude of the people; and in order to force an assertion of their friendliness I attempted a grand bluff, while I was inwardly quaking.
Approaching the threatening chief I laid my hand uponhis arm and said: “Come and seize this boy if you dare. Come with me and before my face put your hand upon my son.”
“No,” cried the people; and they crowded between the chief and Ndong Koni. The palaver was finished; but I thought it well to pass on to the next town and not wait to hold a service. Before I got away however they crowded around me, saying: “Since you are the father of the Fang surely you ought to give us some tobacco. A father gives tobacco to his sons.”
It is thus frequently in Africa; the serious ends in burlesque; and, perhaps as frequently, comedy ends in tragedy.
The chief himself, coming forward just before my departure, assured me of his good will by solemnly taking my hand in his and spitting in it. I know the theory of some regarding this touching demonstration of affection,—that the native means only to blow with his breath, symbolic of imparting a blessing, and that the spitting is incidental, a “by-product”—so to speak—of the blessing. But as I looked at my hand I realized that it was not a theory, but a condition, that confronted me, a condition that called loudly for soap and water—warmwater and plenty of soap. I have before this acknowledged the receipt of blessings in disguise; but I would cheerfully renounce any possible benefits that might accrue from a blessing coming in such a disguise as this. And if the old chief had approached me a second time with the offer of a blessing on the other hand, I would have said: “Please give me a curse instead, by way of variety.”
The form of “socialism,” by which any one of a village may be seized and killed by the enemy for the wrong of any other of that same village, is even carried further, and to the extent that one person may be given over to the enemy for the wrong done by another person. I havealready said, in reference to the Bulu, that at the end of a war the ordinary way of settling the palaver is that the side that has done the most killing will pay over to the other side a corresponding number of women, who become wives or sometimes slaves in the enemy’s town.
In war they are not careful to kill only the enemy, but often shoot recklessly at any one in sight who might possibly belong to the other side, not waiting to be sure about it. In the dark forest they often mistake a friend for a foe, with dreadful consequences. On the river it is not so frequent.
One evening one of my boys, Amvama, who afterwards became a catechist, an honest and lovable boy, was in a canoe on the river, fishing with a net. It was evening and he was in the shade of overhanging trees. Several canoes approached and the people mistaking Amvama fired upon him. He hastened to the bank and leaving the canoe and net fled into the forest, while they seized all that he had left. They afterwards learned who it was that they had so nearly killed. Amvama’s people demanded his canoe and net, which were surrendered. But the civilized Amvama cared less for the loss of these things than for the personal outrage done him in their attempt to kill him. He indignantly put the question: “Why did you fire upon me?”
They only replied: “How did we know it was you?”
“How did you know it wasnotI?” responded Amvama. But it is not likely that the discussion contributed greatly to the science of ethics among the Fang.
There is a strange war-custom in all the tribes of West Africa unlike anything that I have known or heard of elsewhere. Often when a woman is stolen from a small and poorly defended town, the people, desiring to make a desperate protest, or being unusually resentful and fierce, will kill some person of a third town that has nothingwhatever to do with the palaver, by way of drawing attention to the fact that a crime has been committed and of impressing the community with its enormity. But it seems hard that a man should be punished for a crime without having the pleasure of committing it. Sometimes, however, this is done to enlist the help of the third town. For, this third town according to custom is not supposed to retaliate directly but will unite with the town which has killed one of their people in wreaking vengeance upon the first town, which was the original offender and therefore the cause of all the trouble.
Imagine A, B and C to be three schoolboys; the principle of the custom then is this (if the colloquial language may be pardoned): A licks B; B, not being able to lick A, lies in wait for C and licks him; then C joins with B and they together lick A. The moral beauty of this principle is evident: A, B and C each get licked.
On one occasion when holding a service in a town we heard two shots fired in rapid succession in another town close by. Each shot killed a man; one of them was a chief. They were unarmed and suspecting no harm; for neither they nor their people had anything to do with the palaver which was the occasion of the killing; nor had they even heard of it. A man of the town that I was visiting and who was then sitting in the audience had just stolen a woman from another town, which latter town was small and poorly defended. Being desperate, and in order that they might not be a prey to stronger towns, they resorted to this peculiar mode of justice that they might form a strong coalition against the enemy. In this they succeeded and fourteen persons were killed before that palaver was ended.
Among the Mpongwe, in the old days before the foreign power was established, and among the closely related tribes south of them, this custom prevailed in an extremeform. A woman being stolen, the people of the offended town would hurry to another town near by before the news had reached them and would kill somebody. This town would then hurry to the next and kill somebody there, each town doing likewise until perhaps five or six persons of as many different towns would be killed in one night. The last town would then, with the help of the others, demand justice from the first. It may be that the object of this frightful custom was to restrain men from committing the initial crime, that might be attended with such widespread death, bringing upon themselves the curses of many people. For above all things the African cannot bear to be disliked and cannot endure execration.
The chief amusements of the Fang and other tribes of West Africa are music, dancing and story-telling. In these, and at all times, they exhibit a strong sense of humour, truly surprising in an uncivilized people. In this faculty they are next to our own race and quite unequalled by others. In their survival of suffering and oppression, in their easy forgetfulness of injury, and their constant buoyancy of mind, who can tell how much they owe to their keen sense of humour? The pain of suffering and the weight of heavy burdens are mitigated by frequent laughter. They are fond of incongruous comparisons. On one occasion when we were travelling on the river there was on board a white man who was very bald, and who attracted considerable attention from the crew because they had never seen a bald white man before. One of their number cheered up a lot of tired boys by remarking that the head of that white man was like a fresh-laid egg.
They are passionately fond of music; but their sense of rhythm is far more keen than their sense of melody. Accordingly the drum in various forms is the favourite instrument. There are two principal kinds of drum,both made from the trunk of a tree hollowed out, and about four feet long. One of these stands upright and the open end is covered with deerskin. It is beaten with the palms of the hand. They play remarkably well upon this drum. With great variety in the beat they maintain a constant and perfect rhythm.
The other drum, which is larger, lies on its side, has closed ends, and a long narrow opening in the side. It is beaten with two heavy sticks. The wood of the drum is very resonant and it can be heard at a distance of many miles. It is used as a kind of telegraph between towns, and messages are sent upon it. This is done by means of a secret language of inarticulate sounds which they are able to imitate upon the drum, according to the part of it which they strike and the regularity of the stroke. The women do not understand it, except a few common calls. Neither would any one be allowed to teach it to a white man. This telegraphic use of the drum is extraordinary; messages of startling definiteness are sometimes sent ahead of a caravan over a great distance being repeated in town after town. This drum, therefore, bulky and unlikely as it appears, is very skillfully made, being precise in form and with varying shades of thickness in different parts. As to its musical qualities, it may have charms to soothe the savage breast; I am very sure that it could soothe no others; and among white people it would make more savages than it would soothe.
Besides the drums there are several other instruments, but of less importance. The most common of these is a wooden harp with strings made of a vegetable fibre, which respond to the fingers with tinkling notes. There is also a xylophone consisting of a row of parallel wooden bars, graduated in length, and placed upon a base of two parallel banana stocks, which lie upon the ground.Banana stocks are used because they are non-conducting. The wooden bars are hammered with sticks. The notes are pleasant; but the Fang do not make much of it, as it is not sufficiently noisy to impress them. There is still another in common use; a harp with a single string, the sound of which is like the magnified music of a Jew’s-harp.
Their singing, like their instrumental music, has not much “tune” to it, but there is always a stirring rhythm and a certain weird and touching quality, which impressed me the more because I could never quite understand it,—the same elusive charm that characterizes the singing of the negroes of the Southern States. I do not refer to the negro songs composed by white men, which are entirely different, but the melodies that the negro sings at his work. The native songs are of the nature of chants, and turn upon several notes of a minor scale. But it is not quite our minor scale. There is one prominent and characteristic note, which I confess defied me, though it may have been a minor third slightly flat. I found it very difficult to reduce their songs to musical notation.
The words of most of the songs are improvised by the leading voice, and have a regular refrain in which all join. But if they wish to sing in chorus, as in their dance-songs, any words will serve the purpose and the same sentence may be repeated for an hour. “Our old cow she crossed the road” were luminous with propriety and sentiment in comparison with the words that they will sometimes sing in endless repetition. “The leopard caught the monkey’s tail,” “The roots grow underneath the ground,” are samples of their songs. Their canoe-songs I like best of all. The rhythm is appropriate and one almost hears the sound of the paddles. They sing nearly all the time as they use the paddle or the oar, andon a long journey they say it makes the hard work easier. If they should take a white man on a journey and, not being his regular workmen, should expect a “dash”—a fee, or present, in African vernacular—the leading voice will sing the white man’s praises on the journey, alluding in particular to his benevolence, while the others all respond, seeking thus by barefaced flattery and good-natured importunity to shame the meanness out of him.
Dancing, both with old and young, takes the place in general of our games and sports, except that the men also hunt. The music used is that of the two drums already described, especially the upright one, and they usually sing as they dance. They can scarcely listen to the music without indulging the movements of the dance.
Men and women never dance together; and they have nothing like our conventional dances. There is something of the freedom and unrestrained movements of the Italian and Hungarian peasant-dances; yet in comparison with these latter the African dance is a very uncouth performance, though frequently difficult, and extremely grotesque. Its peculiar characteristic is that the feet are no more active than any other part of the body; arms, shoulders, abdomen, head—all the parts and every muscle are set in motion, sometimes including even the eyes and the tongue. Their champions we would call contortionists rather than dancers.
Sometimes famous dancers from different towns, in fantastic and absurd decorations and dress, will contend for the championship in a contest of several days. They dance in the middle of the street before an audience of almost the entire population of the different towns seated on the ground on either side of the street. The music is not adapted to the dance, but the dance to the changing music. The musicians have hard work, and they makeit harder. Streaming with perspiration they beat the drums with changing time and increasing rapidity until they are almost as nearly exhausted as the dancers, and one might think that the music had gone mad. Without doubt the native dance is a fine bodily exercise; and they dance so much that the exercise is perhaps the chief factor in the development of the strength and athletic form of the native.
The women dance on the moonlight nights, and often through the entire night. They all sing as they dance, most of them standing in a circle while individuals one after another step into the middle of the circle and lead the performance. The men are standing around looking on and when a leader finishes her part one or several of her gentlemen friends will step into the circle and embrace her. These dances have always appeared innocent enough to me. But the native Christians, who know better than I, and who also know the side-scenes that invariably attend the dance though not a part of it, uniformly condemn the dance, and say that no Christian ought to take part in it.
They dance on all festive occasions—a betrothal, a marriage, a victory in war, the end of a war, or the end of a term of mourning for the dead. The men decorate themselves with paint and feathers, and often they wear around their ankles strings of native bells, consisting of the dried hull of a certain nut, into which while still green they insert small stones, which make a peculiarly metallic and pleasant noise.
They usually form in two long lines in the street, with the drums across one end. Some great dancer will perform in the middle, down the lines and back, sometimes in graceful movements, and sometimes in contortions almost fiendish until his body seems to have no shape at all “distinguishable in member, joint or limb.” Sometimesthey all move with him down the street and back. They sing and shout as they dance, shaking the bells on their ankles, and occasionally all together suddenly stamping upon the ground. They mark the time to perfection, and the effect of so many men keeping the time perfectly while their movements differ, together with the volume of wild song and shouting is quite fascinating.
The chief dance of the men is that of their Secret Society, which is performed only on very dark nights, the women being compelled to retire to their houses and close the door lest they see it and die. In this dance they deliberately try to be unhuman and hideous in their movements. I once witnessed this dance when I had been but a short time in Africa and did not know the serious nature of my intrusion; and I suppose I came much nearer suffering violence at their hands than I knew at the time. It is the height of indiscretion to show unnecessary contempt for native customs, or to disregard their feelings for the sake of satisfying mere curiosity. But I was not aware of their feelings until it was too late to retreat.
Hearing the drumming and the roar of the gorilla-man I knew they were having a characteristic dance and with a lantern in my hand I started along the bush-path to see it and entered the town before they were aware of my approach. The offense was double. I had turned the light upon the performance, possibly allowing women to see the gorilla-man through the chinks of the houses; and I myself had defied him by looking upon him with uninitiated eyes, for which according to custom I ought to die. He approached me whirling about and contorting his body, roaring the while like a gorilla, and brandished his sword very close to my face, to one side and then the other. But I was not intimidated for the sufficient reason that I did not believe he would touch me. Then, asI stood my ground, he thought to terrorize me by his supernatural powers, which the native would fear far more than a sword. He brought out a number of human bones and laying them on the ground before me he performed a ceremony which was supposed to bring down upon me the wrath of his ancestors. But of the two dangers I was rather more afraid of the sword than the ancestors. They all saw my indifference and concluded that I had with me some fetish stronger than theirs and powerful for my protection; and they resumed the dance while I looked on, having first accommodated them by turning down the light. It was a strange sight, these black phantom-forms darting to and fro in the dark, like flitting shadows often with a wriggling, reptile motion, and shrieking the while like hobgoblins.
I have already spoken at length of the African’s love of story-telling, and have given many examples. The following two stories are types of a large class.
The elephant and the gorilla hate each other, for each thinks himself king of the forest. Meeting one day in the bush-path, each refused to step aside to let the other pass.
“Let me pass,” said the elephant; “for these woods belong to me.”
The gorilla beat his breast and made a noise like the sound of a drum. Then he replied: “Oh, Oh, Oh, Oh! These woods do not belong to you. I am master here.”
The elephant would not move aside; so the gorilla broke down a tree and beat the elephant to death. And the proof of it is that the prostrate tree was found beside the body of the dead elephant.
The sun and moon are great enemies. They are the same age but each claims to be older than the other. The sun is the friend of the people and brings daylight and gladness. The moon hates people and devours them likeinsects; she brings darkness, witchcraft and death. One day the sun and the moon had a palaver and got very angry at each other. The palaver, as usual, began by each one claiming to be older than the other.
The moon said: “Who are you? You are nobody, for you are alone and have no family. My equal? Indeed! Look at these countless stars. They are all my people; but you are alone.”
The sun replied: “Oh, Moon, mother of darkness and of witchcraft! I would have as many people as you if you had not killed them all. But now I have taken the people of the world, men, women and children, to be my family; and I love them all.”