"What is it?"
"I want to eat the flesh of a donkey."
The long cross-examination being concluded the evil spirit was granted his strange request. A donkey was brought and the possessed woman ran hastily upon the animal and bit the flesh out of the creature's back, and though the donkey kicked and started off, she clung to it as though fastened by leather thongs.
After the performance had continued for some time the man recalled the woman, and a jar of prepared liquid with which much filth had been mixed was set down in a hidden spot where she could not see it. When, however, the exorcist exclaimed, "Go and look for your drink," she started off on all fours to the place where the jar stood and drank the whole of its contents.
When she returned, the blacksmith said, "Take up this stone." Although the stone in question was too large for her to move under natural conditions, she placed it on her head with ease and began spinning round, until the stone flew off on one side and she fell on to the ground. Then the exorcist said to the people round, "Take her away to bed, the Bouda has left her."
In a similar case the woman's symptoms began in a sort of fainting-fit; her fingers were clenched in the palms of her hands, the eyes were glazed, the nostrils distended and the whole body stiff and inflexible. Suddenly a hideous laugh, like that of a hyæna, burst from her and she began running about on all fours. The cure was brought about in much the same way as in the preceding case.
Mr. Parkyns also tells the tale of a servant who was said to have been bewitched by a blacksmith-hyæna. He evidently attempted to lure her into the forest with the intention of devouring her.
One evening the howls and laughter of a hyæna were clearly heard from the hut in which the sick woman lay bound and closely guarded. Her master happened to be present, when he saw to his astonishment that she rose "like a Davenport brother" freed from her bonds, and made an effort to escape from the hut in answer to the call of the wild animal without.
That such proceedings were sometimes carried out for vicious ends not unconnected with the slaying of human victims is proved by the existence of the mysterious Human Leopard Society which Mr. T. J. Alldridge writes about in "The Sherbro and Its Hinterland." The society was founded for the purpose of obtaining the human fat used in the preparation of a certain "medicine" mixed with Borfinor, the resulting material being regarded as an all-powerful fetish.
Victims at first were relatives of the members of the society selected at committee meetings, who were afterwards waylaid and slaughtered by a man in the guise of a leopard. He plunged a three-pronged knife into the unfortunate person's neck from behind, separated the vertebræ and caused instant death. More victims were required, outsiders were made to join the society by the expedient of giving them a dish in which, without their knowledge, human flesh was cooked. Afterwards, on being informed of the unpleasant fact, they were persuaded to join the society and told they must furnish a victim as part of the initiation ceremony.