“I sent men up the watchmen’s stations. These were about twenty-five feet high; and, the night being clear, they could distinctly report the movements of a large mass of natives that were ever increasing on the outside of the town, at about two hundred yards distance. The rattle of the Turk’s drum repeatedly sounded in reply to the nogara, and the intended attack seemed destined to relapse into a noisy but empty battle of the drums.”
Toward midnight Commoro came in person, and said that the nogara had been beaten without his orders, and that he would try to quiet the people. He admitted, however, that, if the exploring party had not been on their guard, an attack would really have been made. After this business, Sir Samuel very wisely determined to separate entirely from the Turks, and therefore built himself a camp about a quarter of a mile from the town, so that the Latookas might not again think that the two parties had a common interest.
On the following morning the women appeared with their water jars as usual, and the men, though still excited, and under arms, returned to their homes. By degrees the excitement died away, and then they talked over the affair with perfect frankness, admitting that an attack was meditated, and rather amused that the intended victims should have been aware of their plans.
The Latookas are not free from the vice of thieving, and, when employed as porters, have exercised their craft with so little attempt at concealment, that they have deliberately broken open the parcels which they carried, not taking any notice of the fact that a sentry was watching them within a few yards. Also they would occasionally watch an opportunity, slip aside from the caravan, and sneak away with their loads.
Funeral ceremonies differ among the Latookas according to the mode of death. If a man is killed in battle, the body is not touched, but is allowed to remain on the spot where it fell, to be eaten by the hyænas and the vultures. But should a Latooka, whether man, woman, or child, die a natural death, the body is disposed of in a rather singular manner. Immediately after death, a shallow grave is dug in the enclosure that surrounds each house, and within a few feet of the door. It is allowed to remain here for several weeks, when decomposition is usually completed. It is then dug up, the bones are cleaned and washed, and are then placed in an earthenware jar, and carried about a quarter of a mile outside the village.
No particular sanctity attaches itself either to the bones or the spot on which they are deposited. The earthen jars are broken in course of time, and the bones scattered about, but no one takes any notice of them. In consequence of this custom the neighborhood of a large town presents a most singular and rather dismal aspect, the ground being covered with bones, skulls, and earthenware jars in various states of preservation; and, indeed, the traveller always knows when he is approaching a Latooka town by coming across a quantity of neglected human remains.
The Latookas have not the least idea why they treat their dead in this singular manner, nor why they make so strange a distinction between the bodies of warriors who have died the death of the brave and those who have simply died from disease, accident, or decay. Perhaps there is no other country where the body of the dead warrior is left to the beasts and birds, while those who die natural deaths are so elaborately buried, exhumed, and placed in the public cemetery. Why they do so they do not seem either to know or to care, and, as far as has been ascertained, this is one of the many customs which has survived long after those who practise it have forgotten its signification.
During the three or four weeks that elapse between the interment and exhumation of the body funeral dances are performed. Great numbers of both sexes take part in these dances, for which they decorate themselves in a very singular manner. Their hair helmets are supplemented by great plumes of ostrich feathers, each man wearing as many as he can manage to fasten on his head, and skins of the leopard or monkey are hung from their shoulders. The chief adornment, however, is a large iron bell, which is fastened to the small of the back, and which is sounded by wriggling the body after a very ludicrous fashion. A faithful representation of one of [these dances] is given the reader on page 465.
“A large crowd got up in this style created an indescribable hubbub, heightened by the blowing of horns and the beating of seven nogaras of various notes. Every dancer wore an antelope’s horn suspended round the neck, which he blew occasionally in the height of his excitement. These instruments produced a sound partaking of the braying of a donkey and the screech of an owl. Crowds of men rushed round and round in a sort of galop infernel, brandishing their arms and iron-headed maces, and keeping tolerably in line live or six deep, following the leader, who headed them, dancing backward.
“The women kept outside the line, dancing a slow, stupid step, while a long string of young girls and small children, their heads and necks rubbed with red ochre and grease, and prettily ornamented with strings of beads round their loins, kept a very good line, beating time with their feet, and jingling the numerous iron rings which adorned their ankles to keep time to the drums.