Two Trips to Gorilla Land and the Cataracts of the Congo Volume I Part 3

Pongo-land ignores all such artificial part.i.tions as districts or parishes; the only divisions are the countries occupied by the several tribes.

The Gaboon lies in "Africa-on-the-Line," and a description of the year at Zanzibar Island applies to it in many points.[FN#6] The characteristic of this equatorial belt is uniformity of temperature: whilst the Arabian and the Australian deserts often show a variation of 50 Fahr. in a single day, the yearly range of the mercury at Singapore is about 10. The four seasons of the temperates are utterly unknown to the heart of the tropics--even in Hindostan the poet who would sing, for instance, the charms of spring must borrow the latter word (Buhar) from the Persian. If the "bull" be allowed, the only rule here appears to be one of exceptions. The traveller is always a.s.sured that this time there have been no rains, or no dries, or no tornadoes, or one or all in excess, till at last he comes to the conclusion that the Clerk of the Weather must have mislaid his ledger. Contrary to the popular idea, which has descended to us from the cla.s.sics, the climate under the Line is not of that torrid heat which a vertical sun suggests; the burning zone of the Old World begins in the northern hemisphere, where the regular rains do not extend, beyond the tenth as far as the twenty-fifth degree. The equatorial climate is essentially temperate: for instance, the heat of Sumatra, lying almost under the Line, rarely exceeds 24 R.= 86 Fahr. In the Gaboon the thermometer ranges from 65 to 90 Fahr., "a degree of heat," says Dr. Ford, "less than in many salubrious localities in other parts of the world."

Upon the Gaboon the wet seasons are synchronous with the vertical suns at the vernal and autumnal equinoxes. "The rainy season of a place within the tropics always begins when the sun has reached the zenith of that place. Then the tradewinds, blowing regularly at other seasons, become gradually weaker, and at length cease and give way to variable winds and calms. The trade-wind no longer brings its regular supply of cooler, drier air; the rising heats and calms favour an ascending current" (in the sea-depths, I may add, as well as on land), "which bears the damp air into the upper regions of the atmosphere, there to be cooled, and to occasion the heavy down-pour of each afternoon. The nights and mornings are for the most part bright and clear. When the sun moves away from the zenith, the trade-winds again begin to be felt, and bring with them the dry season of the year, during which hardly ever a cloud disturbs the serenity of the skies.

"Between the tropical limits and the equator, however, the sun comes twice to the zenith of each place. If now, between the going and coming of the sun, from the Line to its furthest range, a sufficient pause intervenes, or if the sun's temporary distance from the zenith is great enough, the rainy season is divided into two portions, separated by a lesser dry season. Closer to the tropical lines, where the sun remains but once in the zenith, the rainy season is a continuous one."

Such is the theory of the "Allgemeine Erdkunde" (Hahn, Hochstetter and Pokorny, Prague, 1872). An explanation should be added of the reason why the cool wind ceases to blow, at the time when the air, heated and raised by a perpendicular sun, might be expected to cause a greater indraught. We at once, I have said, recognize its correctness at sea. The Gaboon, "in the belt of calms, with rain during the whole year," has two distinctly marked dry seasons, at the vernal and the autumnal equinoxes. The former or early rains (Nchangya?) are expected to begin in February, with violent tornadoes and storms, especially at the full and change, and to end in April. The heavy downfalls are mostly at night, possibly an effect of the Sierra del Crystal. I found March 28th (1862) very like damp weather at the end of an English May; April 6th was equally exceptional, raining from dawn to evening. During my trip to Sanga-Tanga and back (March 25th to 29th) we had frequent fogs, locally called "smokes," and almost daily tornadoes, sometimes from the south-east, whilst the lightning was dangerous as upon the Western prairies. After an interval of fiery sun, with occasional rain torrents and discharges of electricity, begin the Enomo (Enun?), the "middle"

or long dries, which last four months to September. The "Enomo"

is the Angolan Cacimbo, meaning cool and cloudy weather, when no umbrella is required, and when the invariably grey sky rarely rains. Travellers are told that June and July are the cream of the year, the healthiest time for seasoned Europeans, and this phantom of a winter renders the climate more supportable to the northern const.i.tution.

During the "middle dries," when the sun, retiring to the summer solstice, is most distant, land winds and sea breezes are strong and regular, and the people suffer severely from cold. In the Gaboon heavy showers sometimes fall, July being the least subject to them, and the fiery sun, when it can disperse the clouds, turns the soil to dust. At the end of September appear the "latter rains," which are the more copious, as they seldom last more than six hours at a time. It is erroneous to a.s.sert that "the tract nearest the equator on both sides has the longest rainy season;" the measure chiefly depends upon alt.i.tude and other local conditions.

The rainy seasons are healthier for the natives than the cold seasons; and the explorer is often urged to take advantage of them. He must, however, consult local experience. Whilst ascending rivers in November, for instance, he may find the many feet of flood a boon or a bane, and his marching journeys are nearly sure to end in ulcerated feet, as was the case with poor Dr. Livingstone. The rains drench the country till the latter end of December, when the Nanga or "little dries" set in for two months. The latter also are not unbroken by storms and showers, and they end with tornadoes, which this year (1862) have been unusually frequent and violent. Thus we may distribute the twelve months into six of rains, vernal and autumnal, and six of dry weather, aestival and hibernal: the following table will show the sub-sections:--

Early December to early February, the "little dries;" February to early April, the "former," early or spring rains; May to early June, the variable weather; June to early September, the Cacimbo, Enomo, long or middle dries; September to early December, the "latter rains."

Under such media the disease, par excellence, of the Gaboon is the paroxysm which is variously called Coast, African, Guinea, and Bullom fever. Dr. Ford, who has written a useful treatise upon the subject,[FN#7] finds hebdomadal periodicity in the attacks, and lays great stress upon this point of chronothermalism. He recognizes the normal stages, preparatory, invasional, reactionary, and resolutionary. Like Drs. Livingstone and Hutchinson, he holds fever and quinine "incompatibles," and he highly approves of the prophylactic adhibition of chinchona used by the unfortunate Douville in 1828. Experience in his own person and in numerous patients "proves all theoretical objections to the use of six grains an hour, or fifty and sixty grains of quinine in one day or remission to be absolutely imaginary." He is "convinced that it is not a stimulant," and with many apologies he cautiously sanctions alcohol, which should often be the physician's mainstay. As he advocated ten-grain doses of calomel by way of preliminary cathartic, the American missionaries stationed on the River have adopted a treatment still more "severe"--quinine till deafness ensues, and half a handful of mercury, often continued till a pa.s.sage opens through the palate, placing mouth and nose in directer communication. Dr.

Ford also recommends during the invasion or period of chills external friction of mustard or of fresh red pepper either in tincture or in powder, a good alleviator always procurable; and the internal use of pepper-tea, to bring on the stages of reaction and resolution. Few will agree with him that gruels and farinaceous articles are advisable during intermissions, when the patient craves for port, essence of beef, and consomme; nor can we readily admit the dictum that in the tropics "the most wholesome diet, without doubt, is chiefly vegetable." Despite Jacquemont and all the rice-eaters, I cry beef and beer for ever and everywhere! Many can testify personally to the value of the unofficinal prescription which he offers in cases of severe lichen (p.r.i.c.kly heat), leading to impetigo. It is as follows, and it is valuable:--

Cold cream. . . . . . . . . . 3j.

Glycerine . . . . . . . . . . 3j.

Chloroform . . . . . . . . .3ij.

Oil of bitter almonds . . gtt. x.

Chapter IV.

The Minor Tribes and the Mpongwe.

The tribes occupying the Gaboon country may roughly be divided into two according to habitat--the maritime and those of the interior, who are quasi-mountaineers. Upon the sea-board dwell the Banoko (Banaka), Bapuka, and Batanga; the Kombe, the Benga and Mbiko, or people about Corisco; the Shekyani, who extend far into the interior, the Urungu and Aloa, clans of Cape Lopez; the Nkommi, Commi, Camma or Cama, and the Mayumba races beyond the southern frontier. The inner hordes are the Dibwe (M. du Chaillu's "Ibouay"), the Mbusha; the numerous and once powerful Bakele, the Cannibal Fan (Mpongwe), the Osheba or 'Sheba, their congeners, and a variety of "bush-folk," of whom little is known beyond the names. Linguistically we may distribute them into three, namely, 1. the Banoko and Batanga; 2. the Mpongwe, including the minor ethnical divisions of Benga, and Shekyani; the Urungu, the Nkommi, the Dongas or Ndiva, and the Mbusha, and 3. the Mpongwe and the tribes of the interior. Lastly, there are only three peoples of any importance, namely, the Mpongwe, the Bakele, and the Fan.

The Mpongwe, whom the French call "les Gabons," are the aristocracy of the coast, the Benga being the second, and the Banoko and Bapuka ranking third. They are variously estimated at 5,000 to 7,000 head, serviles included. They inhabit both sides of the Gaboon, extending about thirty-five miles along its banks, chiefly on the right; on the left only seawards of the Shekyani.

But it is a wandering race, and many a "mercator vagus" finds his way to Corisco, Cape Lopez, Batanga, and even Fernando Po. The two great families on the northern river bank are the Quabens and the Gla.s.s, who style themselves kings and princes; the southern side lodges King William (Roi Denis) near the mouth, and the powerful King George, about twenty-five miles higher up stream.

There are also settlements scattered at various distances from the great highway of commerce to which they naturally cling, and upon the Coniquet and Parrot Islands.

Barbot (iv. 9) describes the "Gaboon blacks" as "commonly tall, robust, and well-shaped;" they appeared to me rather below the average of West Coast size and weight. Both s.e.xes, even when running to polysarcia, have delicate limbs and extremities, and the features, though negroid, are not the negro of the tobacconist's shop: I noticed several pyramidal and brachycephalic heads, contrary to the rule for African man and simiad. In the remarkable paper read (1861) by Professor Busk before the Ethnological Society, that eminent physiologist proved that the Asiatic apes, typified by the ourang-outang, are brachycephalic, like the Mongolians amongst whom they live, or who live amongst them; whilst the gorillas and the African anthropoids are dolichocephalic as the negroes. The Gaboon men are often almost black, whilst the women range between dark brown and cafe au lait. The beard, usually scanty, is sometimes bien fournie, especially amongst the seniors, but, whenever I saw a light-coloured and well-bearded man, the suspicion of mixed blood invariably obtruded itself. It is said that during the last thirty years they have greatly diminished, yet their habitat is still that laid down half a century ago by Bowdich, and all admit that the population of the river has not been materially affected.

The Mpongwe women have the reputation of being the prettiest and the most facile upon the West African coast. It is easy to distinguish two types. One is large-boned and heavy-limbed, hoa.r.s.e-voiced, and masculine, like the "Ibos" of Bonny and New Calabar, who equal the men in weight and stature, strength and endurance, suggesting a mixture of the male and female temperaments. Some of the Gaboon giantesses have, unlike their northern sisters, regular and handsome features. The other type is quasi-Hindu in its delicacy of form, with small heads, oval faces, noses a la Roxolane, lips sub-tumid but without prognathism, and fine almond-shaped eyes, with remarkably thick and silky lashes. The throat is thin, the bosom is high and well carried, or, as the admiring Arab says, "nejda;" the limbs are statuesque, and the hands and feet are Norman rather than Saxon.

Many Europeans greatly admire these minois mutins et chiffones.[FN#8]

Early in the present century the Mpongwe braided whiskers and side curls, tipping the ends with small beads, and they plaited the front locks to project like horns, after the fas.h.i.+on of the present Fan and other wild tribes. A custom noticed by Barbot, but apparently obsolete in the days of Bowdich, was to bore the upper lip, and to insert a small ivory pin, extending from nose to mouth. The painting and tattooing were fantastic and elaborate; and there was a hideous habit of splitting either lip, so as to "thrust the tongue through on ceremonial occasions." A curious reason is given for this practice. "They are subject to a certain distemper very common there, which on a sudden seizes them, and casts them into fits of so long a continuance, that they would inevitably be suffocated, if by means of the split at their upper lip they did not pour into their mouths some of the juice of a certain medicinal herb, which has the virtue of easing and curing the diseased person in a very short time."

All these things, fits included, are now obsolete. The men shave a line in the hair like a fillet round the skull, and what is left is coiffe au coup de vent. The head-dress is a cap, a straw hat, a billy c.o.c.k, or a tall silk "chimney pot," the latter denoting a chief; he also sports in full dress a broad coat, ending in a loin cloth of satin stripe or some finer stuff, about six feet long by four and a half broad; it is secured by a kerchief or an elastic waist belt; during work it is tucked up, but on ceremonial occasions it must trail upon the ground. The lieges wear European s.h.i.+rts, stuffed into a waist-cloth of cheaper material, calico or domestics; This Tanga, or kilt, is, in fact, an article of general wear, and it would be an airy, comfortable, and wholesome travelling costume if the material were flannel. The ornaments are necklaces of Venetian beads, the white pound, and the black and yellow seed: Canutille or bugles of various patterns are preferred, and all are loaded with "Mengo," Grigris (which old travellers call "gregories"), or talismans, chiefly leopards' teeth, rude bells, and horns. The Monda are hunting prophylacteries, antelope horns filled with "fetish" medicines, leopard's hair, burnt and powdered heart mixed with leaves, and filth; the mouths are stopped with some viscid black stuff, probably gum. They are often attached to rude bells of iron or bra.s.s (Igelenga, Ngenge, Nkendo, or Wonga), like the Chingufu of the Congo regions and the metal cones which are struck for signals upon the Tanganyika Lake.

A great man is known by his making himself a marvellous "guy,"

wearing, for instance, a dingily laced c.o.c.ked hat, stuck athwart- s.h.i.+ps upon an unwashed night-cap, and a naval or military uniform, fifty years old, "swearing" with the loin-cloth and the feet, which are always bare.

The coiffure of the is peculiar and elaborate as that of the Gold Coast. These ladies seem to have chosen for their model the touraco or c.o.c.katoo,--they have never heard of "Kikeriki,"--and the effect is at first wondrously grotesque. Presently the eye learns to admire pretty f.a.n.n.y's ways; perhaps the pleureuse, the old English corkscrew ringlet, might strike the stranger as equally natural in a spaniel, and unnatural in a human. Still a style so peculiar requires a toilette in keeping; the "king" in uniform is less ridiculous than the Gaboon lady's chignon, contrasting with a tight-bodied and narrow-skirted gown of pink calico.

The national "tire-valiant" is a galeated crest not unlike the cuira.s.sier's helmet, and the hair, trained from the sides into a high ridge running along the cranium, not unfrequently projects far beyond the forehead. Taste and caprice produce endless modifications. Sometimes the crest is double, disposed in parallel ridges, with a deep hollow between; or it is treble, when the two lines of parting running along the mastoids make it remarkably like bears' ears, the central prism rises high, and the side hair is plaited into little pig-tails. Others again train four parallel lines from nape to forehead, forming two cus.h.i.+ons along the parietals. The crest is heightened by padding, and the whole of the hair is devoted to magnifying it,--at a distance, some of the bushwomen look as if they wore c.o.c.ked hats.

When dreaded baldness appears, rosettes of false hair patch the temples, and plaits of purchased wigs are interwoven to increase the bulk: the last resources of all are wigs and toupets of stained pine-apple fibre. The comb is unknown, its succedaneum being a huge bodkin, like that which the Trasteverina has so often used as a stiletto. This instrument of castigation is made of ivory or metal, with a lozenge often neatly carved and ornamented at the handle. The hair, always somewhat "kinky," is anointed every morning with palm-oil, or the tallow-like produce of a jungle-nut; and, in full dress, it is copiously powdered with light red or bright yellow dust of pounded camwood, redwood, and various barks.

The ears are adorned with broad rings of native make, and, near the trading stations, with French imitation jewellery. The neck supports many strings of beads, long and short, with the indispensable talismans. The body dress is a Tobe or loin-cloth, like that of the men; but under the "Namba," or outer wrapper, which hangs down the feet, there is a "Siri," or petticoat, reaching only to the knees. Both are gathered in front like the Shukkah of the eastern coast, and the bosom is left bare. Few except the bush-folk now wear the Ibongo, Ipepe, or Ndengi, the woven fibres and gra.s.s-cloths of their ancestry; amongst the hunters, however, a Tanga, or gra.s.s-kilt, may still be seen. The exposure of the upper person shows the size and tumidity of the areola, even in young girls; being unsupported, the mammae soon become flaccid.

The legs, which are peculiarly neat and well turned, are made by art a fitting set-off to the head. It is the pride of a Mpongwe wife to cover the lower limb between knee and ankle with an armour of metal rings, which are also worn upon the wrists; the custom is not modern, and travellers of the seventeenth century allude to them. The rich affect copper, bought in wires two feet and a half long, and in two sizes; of the larger, four, of the smaller, eight, go to the dollar; the bra.s.s are cheaper, as 5: 4; and I did not see iron or tin. The native smiths make the circles, and the weight of a full set of forty varies from fifteen to nineteen pounds. They are separate rings, not a single coil, like that used by the Wagogo and other East African tribes; they press tightly on the limb, often causing painful chafes and sores. The ankle is generally occupied by a bra.s.s or iron chain, with small links. Girls may wear these rings, of which the husband is expected to present a considerable number to his bride, and the consequence is, that when in full dress she waddles like a duck.

Commerce and intercourse with whites has made the Mpongwe, once the rudest, now one of the most civilized of African tribes; and, upon the whole, there is an improvement. The exact Barbot (iv. 9) tells us "the Gaboon blacks are barbarous, wild, b.l.o.o.d.y, and treacherous, very thievish and crafty, especially towards strangers. The women, on the contrary, are as civil and courteous to them, and will use all possible means to enjoy their company; but both s.e.xes are the most wretchedly poor and miserable of any in Guinea, and yet so very haughty, that they are perfectly ridiculous ... They are all excessively fond of brandy and other strong liquors of Europe and America ... If they fancy one has got a mouthful more than another, and they are half drunk, they will soon fall a-fighting, even with their own princes or priests ... Their exceeding greediness for strong liquors renders them so little nice and curious in the choice of them, that, though mixed with half water, and sometimes a little Spanish soap put into it to give it a froth, to appear of proof by the sc.u.m it makes, they like it and praise it as much as the best and purest brandy."

Captain Boteler remarks, in 1827: "The women do not speak English; though, for the sake of what trifles they can procure for their husbands, they are in the habit of flocking on board the different vessels which visit the river, and will permit them to remain; and the wives are generally maintained in clothing by the proceeds of their intercourse with the whites." He further a.s.sures us, that mulatto girls thus born are not allowed to marry, although there is no such restriction for the males; and elsewhere, he concludes, that never having seen an infant or an adult offspring of mixed blood, abortion is practised as at Delagoa and Old Calabar, where, in 1862, I found only one child of mixed blood. If so, the Mpongwe have changed for the better.

Half-castes are now not uncommon; there are several nice "yaller gals" well known on the river; and the number of old and sick speaks well for the humanity of the tribe.

Devoted to trade and become a people of brokers, of go-betweens, of middle-men, the Mpongwe have now acquired an ease and propriety, a polish and urbanity of manner which contrasts strongly with the Kru-men and other tribes, who, despite generations of intercourse with Europeans, are rough and barbarous as their forefathers. The youths used to learn English, which they spoke fluently and with tolerable accent, but always barbarously; they are more successful with the easier neo-Latin tongues. Their one aim in life is not happiness, but "trust," an African practice unwisely encouraged by Europeans; so Old Calabar but a few years ago was not a trust-river," and consequently the consul and the gunboat had little to do there. Many of them have received advances of dollars by thousands, but the European merchant has generally suffered from his credulity or rapacity.

In low cunning the native is more than a match for the stranger; moreover, he has "the pull" in the all-important matter of time; he can spend a fortnight haggling over the price of a tooth when the unhappy capitalist is eating his heart. Like all the African aristocracy, they hold agriculture beneath the dignity of man and fit only for their women and slaves; the "ladies" also refuse to work at the plantations, especially when young and pretty, leaving them to the bush-folk, male and female. M. du Chaillu repeatedly a.s.serts (chap xix.) "there is no property in land,"

but this is a mistake often made in Africa. Labourers are hired at the rate of two to three dollars per mensem, and gangs would easily be collected if one of the chiefs were placed in command.

No sum of money will buy a free-born Mpongwe, and the sale is forbidden by the laws of the land. A half-caste would fetch one hundred dollars; a wild "n.i.g.g.e.r" near the river costs from thirty to thirty-five dollars; the same may be bought in the Apinji country for four dollars' worth of a.s.sorted goods, the "bundle- trade" as it is called; but there is the imminent risk of the chattel's running away. A man's only attendants being now his wives and serviles, it is evident that plurality and domestic servitude will extend--

"Far into summers which we shall not see;"

in fact, till some violent revolution of society shall have introduced a servant cla.s.s.

The three grades of Mpongwe may be considered as rude beginnings of caste. The first are the "Sons of the Soil," the "Ongwa ntye"

(contracted from Onwana wi ntye), Mpongwes of pure blood; the second are the "Mbamba," children of free-men by serviles; and lastly, "Nshaka," in Bakele "Nshaka," represents the slaves. M.

du Chaillu's distribution (chap, iii.) into five orders, namely, pure, mixed with other tribes, half free, children of serviles, and chattels, is somewhat over-artificial; at any rate, now it is not generally recognized. Like the high-caste Hindu, the n.o.bler race will marry women of lower cla.s.ses; for instance, King Njogoni's mother was a Benga; but the inverse proceeding is a disgrace to the woman, apparently an instinctive feeling on the part of the reproducer, still lingering in the most advanced societies. Old travellers record a belief that, unlike all other Guinea races, the Mpongwe marries his mother, sister, or daughter; and they compare the practice with that of the polished Persians and the Peruvian Incas, who thus kept pure the solar and lunar blood. If this "breeding-in" ever existed, no trace of it now remains; on the contrary, every care is taken to avoid marriages of consanguinity. Bowdich, indeed, a.s.sures us that a man may not look at nor converse with his mother-in-law, on pain of a heavy, perhaps a ruinous fine; "this singular law is founded on the tradition of an incest."

Marriage amongst the Mpongwe is a purely civil contract, as in Africa generally, and so perhaps it will some day be in Europe, Asia, and America. C?lebs pays a certain sum for the bride, who, where "marriage by capture" is unknown, has no voice in the matter. Many promises of future "dash" are made to the girl's parents; and drinking, drumming, and dancing form the ceremony.

The following is, or rather I should say was, a fair list of articles paid for a virgin bride. One fine silk hat, one cap, one coat; five to twenty pieces of various cottons, plain and ornamental; two to twenty silk kerchiefs; three to thirty jars of rum; twenty pounds of trade tobacco; two hatchets; two cutla.s.ses; plates and dishes, mugs and gla.s.ses, five each; six knives; one kettle; one bra.s.s pan; two to three Neptunes (caldrons, the old term being "Neptune's pots"), a dozen bars of iron; copper and bra.s.s rings, chains with small links, and minor articles ad libitum. The "settlement" is the same in kind, but has increased during the last forty years, and specie has become much more common.[FN#10]

After marriage there is a mutual accommodation system suggesting the cicisbeo or mariage a trois school; hence we read that wives, like the much-maligned Xantippe, were borrowed and lent, and that not fulfilling the promise of a loan is punishable by heavy damages. Where the husband acts adjutor or cavaliere to his friend's "Omantwe"--female person or wife--and the friend is equally complaisant, wedlock may hardly be called permanent, and there can be no tie save children. The old immorality endures; it is as if the command were reversed by accepting that misprint which so scandalized the Star Chamber, "Thou shalt commit adultery." Yet, unpermitted, the offence is one against property, and Moechus may be cast in damages ranging from $100 to $200: what is known in low civilization as the "panel dodge" is an infamy familiar to almost all the maritime tribes of Africa. He must indeed be a Solomon of a son who, sur les bords du Gabon, can guess at his own sire; a question so impertinent is never put by the ex-officio father. The son succeeds by inheritance to his father's relict, who, being generally in years, is condemned to be useful when she has ceased to be an ornament, and, if there are several, they are equally divided amongst the heirs.

Trading tribes rarely affect the pundonor which characterizes the pastoral and the predatory; these people traffic in all things, even in the chast.i.ty of their women. What with pre-nuptial excesses, with early unions, often infructuous, with a virtual system of community, and with universal drunkenness, it is not to be wondered at if the maritime tribes of Africa degenerate and die out. Such apparently is the modus operandi by which Nature rids herself of the effete races which have served to clear the ground and to pave the way for higher successors. Wealth and luxury, so generally inveighed against by poets and divines, injure humanity only when they injuriously affect reproduction; and poverty is praised only because it breeds more men. The true tests of the physical prosperity of a race, and of its position in the world, are bodily strength and the excess of births over deaths.

Separation after marriage can hardly be dignified on the Gaboon by the name of divorce. Whenever a woman has or fancies she has a grievance, she leaves her husband, returns to "the paternal" and marries again. Quarrels about the s.e.x are very common, yet, in cases of adultery the old murderous a.s.saults are now rare except amongst the backwoodsmen. The habit was simply to shoot some man belonging to the seducer's or to the ravisher's village; the latter shot somebody in the nearest settlement, and so on till the affair was decided. In these days "violent retaliation for personal jealousy always 'be-littles' a man in the eyes of an African community." Perhaps also he unconsciously recognizes the sentiment ascribed to Mohammed, "Laysa bi-zanyatin ilia bi zani,"

"there is no adulteress without an adulterer," meaning that the husband has set the example.

Polygamy is, of course, the order of the day; it is a necessity to the men, and even the women disdain to marry a "one-wifer." As amongst all pluralists, from Moslem to Mormon, the senior or first married is No. 1; here called "best wife:" she is the goodman's viceroy, and she rules the home-kingdom with absolute sway. Yet the Mpongwe do not, like other tribes on the west coast, practise that separation of the s.e.xes during gestation and lactation, which is enjoined to the Hebrews, recommended by Catholicism, and commanded by Mormonism--a system which partly justifies polygamy. In Portuguese Guinea the enceinte is claimed by her relatives, especially by the women, for three years, that she may give undivided attention to her offspring, who is rightly believed to be benefited by the separation, and that she may return to her husband with renewed vigour. Meanwhile custom allows the man to co-habit with a slave girl.

Polygamy, also, in Africa is rather a political than a domestic or social inst.i.tution. A "judicious culture of the marriage tie"

is necessary amongst savages and barbarians whose only friends and supporters are blood relations and nuptial connections; besides which, a mult.i.tude of wives ministers to the great man's pride and influence, as well as to his pleasures and to his efficiency. When the head wife ages, she takes charge of the girlish brides committed to her guardians.h.i.+p by the husband. I should try vainly to persuade the English woman that there can be peace in households so const.i.tuted: still, such is the case.

Messrs. Wilson and Du Chaillu both a.s.sert that the wives rarely disagree amongst themselves. The sentimental part of love is modified; the common husband becomes the patriarch, not the paterfamilias; the wife is not the mistress, but the mere de famille. The alliance rises or sinks to one of interest and affection instead of being amorous or uxorious, whilst the underlying idea, "the more the merrier," especially in lands where free service is unknown, seems to stifle envy and jealousy.

Everywhere, moreover, amongst polygamists, the husband is strictly forbidden by popular opinion to show preference for a favourite wife; if he do so, he is a bad man.

But polygamy here has not rendered the women, as theoretically it should, a down-trodden moiety of society; on the contrary, their position is comparatively high. The marriage connection is not "one of master and slave," a link between freedom and serfdom; the "weaker vessel" does not suffer from collision with the pot de fer; generally the fair but frail ones appear to be, as amongst the Israelites generally, the better halves. Despite the Okosunguu or cow-hide "peacemaker," they have conquered a considerable lat.i.tude of conducting their own affairs. When poor and slaveless and, naturally, when no longer young, they must work in the house and in the field, but this lot is not singular; in journeys they carry the load, yet it is rarely heavier than the weapons borne by the man. On the other hand, after feeding their husbands, what remains out of the fruits of their labours is their own, wholly out of his reach--a boon not always granted by civilization. As in Unyamwezi, they guard their rights with a truly feminine touchiness and jealousy. There is always, in the African mind, a preference for descent and inheritance through the mother, "the surer side,"--an unmistakable sign, by the by, of barbarism. 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. As a rule, the husband cannot sell his wife's children whilst her brother may dispose of them as he pleases--the vox populi exclaims, "What! is the man to go hungry when he can trade off his sister's brats?"

The strong-minded of London and New York have not yet succeeded in thoroughly organizing and popularizing their clubs; the belles sauvages of the Gaboon have. There is a secret order, called "Njembe," a Rights of Woman a.s.sociation, intended mainly to counterbalance the Nda of the lords of creation, which will presently be described. Dropped a few years ago by the men, it was taken up by their wives, and it now numbers a host of initiated, limited only by heavy entrance fees. This form of freemasonry deals largely in processions, whose preliminaries and proceedings are kept profoundly secret. At certain times an old woman strikes a stick upon an "Orega" or crescent-shaped drum, hollowed out of a block of wood; hearing this signal, the wors.h.i.+pful sisterhood, bedaubed, by way of insignia, with red and white chalk or clay, follow her from the village to some remote nook in the jungle, where the lodge is tiled. Sentinels are stationed around whilst business is transacted before a vestal fire, which must burn for a fortnight or three weeks, in the awe- compelling presence of a bra.s.s pipkin filled with herbs, and a basin, both zebra'd like the human limbs. The Rev. William Walker was once detected playing "Peeping Tom" by sixty or seventy viragos, who attempted to exact a fine of forty dollars, and who would have handled him severely had he not managed to escape. The French officers, never standing upon ceremony in such matters, have often insisted upon being present.