Although generally very rich in cattle, and fond of animal diet, their beasts would seem to be kept rather for show than for food. When an ox is killed, the greater portion of the animal is disposed of by the owner to the neighbors, who give the produce of their ground in exchange.
The morality of the Ovambo is very low, and polygamy is practiced to a great extent. A man may have as many wives as he can afford to keep; but, as with the Damaras, there is always one who is the favorite and the highest in rank. Woman is looked upon as a mere commodity—an article of commerce. If the husband be poor, the price of a wife is two oxen and one cow; but should his circumstances be tolerably flourishing, three oxen and two cows will be expected. The chief, however, is an exception to this rule. In his case, the honor of an alliance with him is supposed to be a sufficient compensation. Our fat friend Nangoro had largely benefited by this privilege; for, though certainly far behind the King of Dahomey in regard to the number of wives, yet his harem boasted of one hundred and six enchanting beauties!
In case of the death of the king, the son of his favorite wife succeeds him; but if he has no male issue by this woman, her daughter then assumes the sovereignty. The Princess Chipanga was the intended successor to Nangoro. My friend thought that his bearded face had made an impression on this amiable lady; but, though experience has since taught us that he was by no means averse to matrimony, he preferred to settle his affections on one of his own fair countrywomen rather than marry the “greasy negress” Chipanga, heiress of Ondonga.
We read of nations who are supposed to be destitute of any religious principles whatever. If we had placed reliance on what the natives themselves told us, we should have set down the Ovambo as one of such benighted races. But can there be so deplorable a condition of the human mind? Does not all nature forbid it? Do not the sun, the moon, the stars, the solemn night, and cheerful dawn, announce a Creator even to the children of the wilderness? Is it not proclaimed in the awful voice of thunder, and written on the sky by
“the most terrible and nimble stroke
Of quick, cross lightning?”
Is it possible that any reasoning creature can be so degraded as not to have some notion, however faint and inadequate, of an Almighty Being? Such a conception is necessarily included, more or less, in all forms of idolatry, even the most absurd and bestial. The indefinable apprehensions of a savage, and his dread of something which he can not describe, are testimonies that at least he suspects (however dimly and ignorantly) that the visible is not the whole. This may be the germ of religion—the first uncouth approaches of “faith” as the “evidence of things not seen”—the distant and imperfectly-heard announcement of a God.
May not our incorrect ideas on this head, in reference to the Ovambo, be attributed to want of time and insufficient knowledge of their language, habits, and shyness in revealing such matters to strangers? When interrogating our guide on the subject of religion, he would abruptly stop us with a “Hush!” Does not this ejaculation express awe and reverence, and a deep sense of his own utter insufficiency to enter on so solemn a theme? The Ovambo always evinced much uneasiness whenever, in alluding to the state of man after death, we mentioned Nangoro. “If you speak in that manner,” they said in a whisper, “and it should come to the hearing of the king, he will think that you may want to kill him.” They, moreover, hinted that similar questions might materially hurt our interest, which was too direct a hint to be misunderstood. To speak of the death of a king or chief, or merely to allude to the heir-apparent, many savage nations consider equivalent to high treason.
As already said, the Ovambo surround their dwellings with high palisades, consisting of stout poles about eight or nine feet in height, fixed firmly in the ground at short intervals from each other. The interior arrangements of these inclosures were most intricate. They comprised the dwelling-houses of masters and attendants, open spaces devoted to amusement and consultation, granaries, pig-sties, roosting-places for fowls, the cattle kraal, and so forth.
