“I heard one day, by accident, that a man had been apprehended on a charge of causing the death of one of the chief men of the village. I went to Dayoko, and asked him about it. He said yes, the man was to be killed; that he was a notorious wizard, and had done much harm. So I begged to see this terrible being. I was taken to a rough hut, within which sat an old, old man, with wool white as snow, wrinkled face, bowed form, and shrunken limbs. His hands were tied behind him, and his feet were placed in a rude kind of stocks. This was the great wizard. Several lazy negroes stood guard over him, and from time to time insulted him with opprobrious epithets and blows, to which the poor old wretch submitted in silence. He was evidently in his dotage.
“I asked him if he had no friends, no relations, no son, or daughter, or wife to take care of him. He said sadly, ‘No one.’
“Now here was the secret of his persecution. They were tired of taking care of the helpless old man, who had lived too long, and a charge of witchcraft by the gree-gree man was a convenient pretext for putting him out of the way. I saw at once that it would be vain to strive to save him. I went, however, to Dayoko, and argued the case with him. I tried to explain the absurdity of charging a harmless old man with supernatural powers; told him that God did not permit witches to exist; and finally made an offer to buy the old wretch, offering to give some pounds of tobacco, one or two coats, and some looking glasses for him—goods which would have bought me an able-bodied slave.
“Dayoko replied that for his part he would be glad to save him, but that the people must decide; that they were much excited against him; but that he would, to please me, try to save his life. During all the night following I heard singing all over the town, and a great uproar. Evidently they were preparing themselves for the murder. Even these savages cannot kill in cold blood, but work themselves into a frenzy of excitement first, and then rush off to do the bloody deed.
“Early in the morning the people gathered together, with the fetish man—the infernal rascal who was at the bottom of the murder—in their midst. His bloodshot eyes glared in savage excitement as he went around from man to man, getting the votes to decide whether the old man should die. In his hands he held a bundle of herbs, with which he sprinkled three times those to whom he spoke. Meantime a man was stationed on the top of a high tree, whence he shouted from time to time in a loud voice, ‘Jocoo! Jocoo!’ at the same time shaking the tree violently. ‘Jocoo’ is devil among the Mbousha, and the business of this man was to drive away the evil spirit, and to give notice to the fetish man of his approach.
“At last the sad vote was taken. It was declared that the old man was a most malignant wizard; that he had already killed a number of people; that he was minded to kill many more; and that he must die. No one would tell me how he was to be killed, and they proposed to defer the execution till my departure, which I was, to tell the truth, rather glad of. The whole scene had considerably agitated me, and I was willing to be spared the end. Tired, and sick at heart, I lay down on my bed about noon to rest, and compose my spirits a little. After a while, I saw a man pass my window almost like a flash, and after him a horde of silent but infuriated men. They ran toward the river. In a little while, I heard a couple of sharp, piercing cries, as of a man in great agony, and then all was still as death.
“I got up, guessing the rascals had killed the poor old man, and, turning my steps toward the river, was met by a crowd returning, every man armed with axe, knife, cutlass, or spear, and these weapons, and their own hands and arms and bodies, all sprinkled with the blood of their victim. In their frenzy they had tied the poor wizard to a log near the river bank, and then deliberately hacked him into many pieces. See the [illustration] on the 526th page. They finished by splitting open his skull, and scattering the brains in the water. Then they returned; and, to see their behavior, it would have seemed as though the country had just been delivered from a great curse. By night the men—whose faces for two days had filled me with loathing and horror, so bloodthirsty and malignant were they—were again as mild as lambs, and as cheerful as though they had never heard of a witch tragedy.”
Once, when shooting in the forest, Du Chaillu came upon a sight which filled him with horror. It was the body of a young woman, with good and pleasant features, tied to a tree and left there. The whole body and limbs were covered with gashes, into which the torturers had rubbed red pepper, thus killing the poor creature with sheer agony.
Among other degrading superstitions, the Shekiani believe that men and women can be changed into certain animals. One man, for example, was said to have been suddenly transformed into a large gorilla as he was walking in the village. The enchanted animal haunted the neighborhood ever afterward, and did great mischief, killing the men, and carrying off the women into the forest. The people often hunted it, but never could manage to catch it. This story is a very popular one, and is found in all parts of the country wherever the gorilla lives.
The Shekiani have another odd belief regarding the transformation of human beings into animals. Seven days after a child is born, the girls of the neighborhood assemble in the house, and keep up singing and dancing all night. They fancy that on the seventh day the woman who waited on the mother would be possessed of an evil spirit, which would change her into an owl, and cause her to suck the blood of the child. Bad spirits, however, cannot endure the sight or sound of human merriment, and so the girls obligingly get up a dance, and baffle the spirit at the same time that they gratify themselves. As in a large village a good many children are born, the girls contrive to insure plenty of dances in the course of the year.