[100] No ostriches are met with in Angola, and as to beads made of ostrich eggs, I can give no explanation.

[101] Monteiro was told that the Sobas and their wives among the Musele only use human fat to anoint their bodies (vol. ii, p. 157).

[102] The practice of wearing such nose ornaments exists to the present day in Lunda, among the Bangala and other tribes (Capello and Ivens, Benguela, vol. i, p. 265; Carvalho, Expedição Portugueza ao Muatianvua, Lingua de Lunda, p. 367; Ethnographia, p. 349).

[103] Marginal note by Purchas: “They use this ceremony in Florida.”

[104] Civet-cats are numerous in this part of Africa.

[105] I am inclined to believe, from what we learn from Cavazzi and other missionaries, that only those children were killed which were born within the Kilombo. On the other hand, at the Court of the ferocious queen Jinga, we are told by Captain Füller, a Dutchman, that, on two days in 1648, 113 new-born infants born outside the camp were killed (Dapper, Africa, p. 545).

[106] Ngunza, according to Cordeira da Matta, means all-powerful; according to Bentley a herald, who speaks on behalf of a chief.

[107] See note, p. [19.]

[108] Human sacrifices among the Jaga are even now of frequent occurrence. They are made at the installation of a Jaga, one year after his election (when the sacrifice and its accompanying banquet are intended to conciliate the spirit of Kinguri, the founder of the Dynasty), at his death, on the outbreak of war, etc. The ceremony witnessed by Battell was an act of divination. The soothsayer summons the spirit of Kinguri, who is supposed to foretell the results of any enterprise about to be undertaken. In 1567, the Jaga Ngonga Kahanga, of Shela, having been advised by his soothsayers that he would suffer defeat in a war he was about to enter upon against the Portuguese, declined the arbitration of the sword, and submitted voluntarily. The body of the victim is cooked with the flesh of a cow, a goat, a yellow dog, a cock and a pigeon, and this mess is devoured (ceremoniously) by the Jaga and his makotas (councillors).

[109] The handle of this switch contains a potent medicine, which protects the owner against death.