The men in Egypt neither bought nor sold; the same is the case in Abyssinia to this day. It is infamy for a man to go to market to buy any thing. He cannot carry water or bake bread; but he must wash the clothes belonging to both sexes; and, in this function, the women cannot help him. In Abyssinia the men carried their burdens on their heads, the women on their shoulders: and this difference, we are told, obtained in Egypt. It is plain that this buying in the public market by women must have ended whenever jealousy or sequestration of that sex began. For this reason it ended early in Egypt; but, for the opposite reason, it subsists in Abyssinia to this day. It was a sort of impiety in Egypt to eat a calf; and the reason was plain, they worshipped the cow. In Abyssinia, to this day, no man eats veal, although every one very willingly eats beef. The Egyptian reason no longer subsists, as in the former case, but the prejudice remains, though they have forgotten their reason.
The Abyssinians eat no wild or water-fowl, not even the goose, which was a great delicacy in Egypt. The reason of this is, that, upon their conversion to Judaism, they were forced to relinquish their ancient municipal customs, as far as they were contrary to the Mosaical law, and the animals in their country not corresponding in form, kind, or name with those mentioned in the Septuagint, or original Hebrew, it has followed that there are many of each class that know not whether they are clean or not, and a wonderful confusion and uncertainty has followed through ignorance or mistake, being unwilling to violate the law in any one instance, though not understanding it.
Among the Gallas of Abyssinia, the Kalijas (magicians) and the Lubas (priests) reign supreme. It is the business of the latter to determine whether any impending war will be successful, and for this purpose the entrails of a goat are consulted. With his long hair streaming wildly, a bright copper circlet decorating his brow, and with a sonorous bell, which he beats to enjoin the silence and attention of the assembled multitude, he plunges his naked arm into the bowels of the freshly-slaughtered animal, and withdrawing part of the intestines, according to their colour declares the prospects of the savage army. In such matters, however, the Kalijas never interferes. His business is to cast out from sick men the evil spirits that torment them. There are eighty-eight evil spirits, say the Kalijas, divided into two bands of forty-three each and ruled and directed by a chief. The Kalijas is untiring in his efforts to hunt out this formidable army of eighty-eight. He goes about with a bell in one hand and a whip in the other, and with a festoon of dried goat’s entrails about his neck. Sent for by a patient he rubs him well with grease, smokes him with aromatic herbs, cries out at the top of his voice, rings his bell with a deafening din, and then lays into the sick person with the whipthong. If all these powerful remedies fail to drive out the Sao or evil spirit, why, the Kalijas resignedly takes his fee and goes away, leaving the victory to the doughty soldier of the eighty six.
In debating on the ills the Abyssinian is heir to the Bouda and Zar must not be forgotten, since they occupy a most prominent place in the catalogue of evils which torture the brown-skinned children of the sun. Of the two the Bouda, or sorcerer, as the word signifies, is the most dreaded. His powers in the black art are reported to be of a most varied character. At one time he will enslave the objects of his malice, at another he will subject them to nameless tortures, and not unfrequently his vengeance will even compass their death. Like the genii and egrets of the Arabian Nights the Bouda invariably selects those possessed of youth and talent, beauty and wit, on whom to work his evil deeds.
A variety of charms have been invented to counteract the Bouda’s power, but the most potent are the amulets written by the pious deleteras and worn round the neck. The dread of the sorcerer has introduced a whole tribe of exorcists who pretend both to be able to conjure the evil spirit and also to detect his whereabout; and these are accordingly held in great awe by the people. Their traffic resembles that of the highwayman; with this difference only—that the one in bold and unblushing language calls on his victim to stand and deliver, the other stealthily creeps into the midst of a troop of soldiers, or amongst a convivial party of friends, and pronounces the mystical word Bouda. The uncouth appearance and sepulchral voice of the exorcist everywhere produce the deepest sensation, and young and old, men and women, gladly part with some article to get rid of his hated and feared presence. If, as sometimes happens, one or two less superstitious individuals object to these wicked exactions, the exorcist has a right to compel every one present to smell an abominable concoction of foul herbs and decayed bones which he carries in his pouch; those who unflinchingly inhale the offensive scent are declared innocent, but those who have not such strong olfactory nerves are declared Boudas and shunned as allies of the evil one.
“During the rainy season,” says Mr. Stern, the most recent of Abyssinian travellers, “when the weather, like the mind, is cheerless and dull, the Boudas, as if in mockery of the universal gloom, celebrate their saturnalia. In our small settlement at Gaffat the monotony of our existence was constantly diversified by a Bouda scene. Towards the close of August, when every tree and shrub began to sprout and blossom, the disease degenerated into a regular epidemic; and in the course of an evening two, three, and not unfrequently every hut occupied by the natives would ring with that familiar household cry. A heavy thunderstorm by some mysterious process seemed invariably to predispose the people to the Bouda’s torturing influence.
“I remember one day about the end of August we had a most tremendous tempest: it commenced a little after mid-day and lasted till nearly five o’clock. During its continuance the air was completely darkened, except when the lightning’s blaze flashed athwart the sky and relieved for a few seconds the almost midnight gloom. No human voice could be heard amidst the thunder’s deafening crash and the torrent’s impetuous rage.
“The noise and tumult of the striving elements had scarcely subsided when one of the servants, a stout, robust, and masculine woman, began to exhibit the Bouda symptoms. She had been complaining the whole noon of langour, faintness, and utter incapacity for all physical exertion. About sunset her lethargy increased, and she gradually sank into a state of apparent unconsciousness. Her fellow servants who were familiar with the cause of her complaint at once pronounced her to be possessed. To outwit the conjuror I thought it advisable to try the effect of strong liquid ammonia on the nerves of the evil one. The place being dark, faggots were ignited; and in their bright flickering light we beheld a mass of dark figures squatted on the wet floor around a rigid and apparently dead woman. I instantly applied my bottle to her nose; but although the potent smell made all near raise a cry of terror, it produced no more effect on the passive and insensible patient than if it had been clear water.
“The owner of Gaffat, an amateur exorcist, almost by instinct, as if anticipating something wrong in that part of his dominion occupied by the Franks, made his appearance in the very nick of time, and no sooner had the bloated and hideous fellow hobbled into the hut, than the possessed woman, as if struck by a magnetic wire, burst into loud fits of laughter and the paroxysms of a maniac.
“Half-a-dozen stalwart fellows caught hold of her, but frenzy imparted vigour to her frame which even the united strength of these athletics was barely sufficient to keep under control. She tried to bite, kick, and tear every one within reach; and when she found herself foiled in all these mischievous attempts she convulsively grasped the unpaved wet floor and, in imitation of the hyæna, gave forth the most discordant sounds. Manacled and shackled with leather thongs, she was now partly dragged, and partly carried, to an open grassy spot; and there in the presence of a considerable number of people the conjuror, in a business-like manner, began his exorcising art.