Stirring scenes in savage lands

by James Greenwood

So much for departed Duketown kings and their eccentricities; now let us turn, for it is worth while, to the present ruler of that locality as well as of the neighbouring settlement of Creektown. It is worth while as furnishing one of a hundred instances that might be quoted of the good effected by the teachings of Christianity, as well as an answer to those wondrously wise folk who sneer at missionaries and their doings. “King Eyo Honesty” is the honourable title of the present monarch of Duketown.

“King Eyo is anxious for the civilization of his people and the cultivation of his country, but he has had no one to teach them anything of the latter, and so the fruitful soil of his dominion lies unproductive, save in the one material of palm oil. Those who agree with me in thinking Christianity and civilization to be cause and effect in Africa, as they are all over the world, will rejoice to hear that he has given every countenance and assistance to the body of Presbyterian missionaries settled at Old Kalabar. He speaks, reads, and writes the English language very well, keeps his own accounts, and translates the Rev. Mr. Waddell’s sermons into the Efick tongue for his congregation. The king’s sons are the only members of his family that have made an open confession of their belief in the doctrines of Christianity, but Eyo enjoins the sacred keeping of the Lord’s day, has no dinner for the traders when it comes round in its eighth day rotation, has abolished the market formerly held on Sundays at Creektown, commands the weekly attendance of his people at the missionary service in the galvanised iron church, is most respectful and attentive during worship, and follows the preacher, translating sentence after sentence for the audience. He is a man past forty years of age, about five feet eight inches in height, of a stout muscular frame, with eyes and lips of the usual prominence observable in the Æthiopian face, and grey whiskers. His dress consists of a cloth, generally silk, tied round his loins, a silk handkerchief thrown over his shoulders, a black hat with a gold band and a binding of the same material about the edge. His ornaments are circlets of blue glass or coral beads round his neck, wrist, and ankles, with a massive gold ring on the index finger. He partakes freely of snuff, and this is carried by his slave in a silver box. It is the only luxury in which he indulges, for he never smokes, and from spirituous liquors no man can be more abstemious. When he goes in state to Duketown, as he always does on business occasions, to the trading ships in the river, he is invariably accompanied by a train of large canoes, from one of which a gun is fired to announce his approach as the royal party turns the angle opposite Oldtown. The king is always seated in a six-oared gig belonging to the ship to which he is proceeding, whilst the canoes contain his eldest son, young Eyo, and his three brothers, with an innumerable host of slave attendants. He has a gigantic parti-coloured parasol held over his head on these occasions, as he has whenever walking about his town, or seated in one of his court-yards, overlooking his trade books. The musical band accompanying the king consists of an Egbo drum, placed transversely in the canoe, which is not beaten on the ends as our drums are, but on the top of its longitudinal surface with a pair of sticks; an instrument formed of iron, as of the saucers of two shovels welded face to face, and struck with a piece of the same metal; a cow’s-horn, blown rather discordantly; and clattering-boxes made of bamboo matting, with a string to them held in the hands like Spanish castanets, and shaken vigorously to produce a noise by the agitation of the pebbles or pieces of broken crockery-ware they contain. Yet, with this primitive attempt at music, the banners flying from the canoes, the simultaneous hoisting of flags on all the ships in the river, and the return of a salute from the vessel to which he is proceeding, when the king’s party becomes visible, gives the whole scene a very animated appearance.”

By-the-by, mention has several times been made of the curious institution existing in this part of the world known as the order of “Egbo.” It is a sort of negro brotherhood of kings, chiefs, and free men, and the title is derived from “Ekpe,” the Efik name for tiger. There are eleven grades, the three superior of which are not purchaseable by slaves. In former times the Egbo title was confined entirely to freemen, the second or third generation of a slave born within the pale of an Egboman’s dwelling being liberated by this fact, and allowed to purchase it after their parents were dead. It cannot be compared to any institution familiar to European minds but to that of Freemasonry. Previous to initiation, the Egbo candidate is obliged to go through a number of ceremonial observances; as, for instance, on a “Brass Egbo”—one of the superior grades—applicant’s admission into that order, his body is daubed over with yellow dye to simulate brass, and there is a sacrifice of animals on the occasion. The secrets and meetings of Egbo men are strictly private. If a man, woman, or child have a complaint of grievance against a master or neighbour, he or she has only to give notification of it by slapping an Egbo gentleman on the front of his body, or by going into the market square and tolling the large Egbo bell. The gentleman apprised by the first-mentioned form of notice, is bound to have at once an Egbo meeting to redress the grievance complained of, and if this be found to be trivial the punishment is inflicted on the complainant. When an Egbo man wants to make a proclamation relative to a theft committed, or the recovery of a debt, he sends out into the town what is supposed to be Idem, or spiritual representation of Egbo, a man with a black vizard on his black face, and the whole of his body covered cap-a-pie with a fantastical dress of bamboo matting. This personage is sometimes preceded by a few drummers, and he always has a bell fastened to his side, which rings as he goes along. In his left hand he carries a bunch of green leaves (for he is believed to have been exorcised from the woods, and of course must keep up his sylvan character); in his right is an enormous cow-hide whip with which he flogs every slave, man or woman, whom he meets, as taste or inclination may suggest. A brutal peculiarity of the Egboship is this, that the want of a single variety of the title will expose him who is so unfortunate as to lack it, to the lashings of the Idem of that particular grade which he has not purchased. If an individual who is in possession of all the inferior grades, and of three of the superior ones, happens to be out on the day when the Idem of that particular Egbo that he was in want of is walking, he is marked out from the common multitude and treated with extra severity. Should the Idem not meet any slave in the streets to whip on his rounds, he is at liberty to go into their houses and whip them to his heart’s content. The sound of Egbo bells, and the name of Egbo day, are enough to terrify all the slave population of Duketown, and when they hear it they hide in every available place. Latterly females have been permitted to buy Egbo privileges, but are not allowed to be present at the councils of the Egbo gentlemen, nor to enter at any time within the wall of the Egbo Palaver-house. When a yellow flag floats from the king’s house it is understood to be Brass Egbo day, and none but a few of the privileged are allowed to walk abroad. A strip of cloth of the same colour nailed to any man’s door implies that his house is under the powerful protection of Brass Egbo, the indication being significant of the master’s absence from home. If an Idem meets a European in his progress, where there are two roads or pathways available, the Idem walks off on the one different from that which the white man is approaching; if there be but one road, the latter is expected to turn his back and let the supposed spirit pass unnoticed and undisturbed. “Aqua Osong,” the last day of the Kalabar week, is grand Egbo day, on which there is a carnival and Egbo procession, with the usual amount of brutality. All legal and judicial proceedings in the country are ushered in and carried out under Egbo demonstrations, for the purpose evidently of keeping the law in terrorem over the slave population. And no stronger evidence of this can be adduced than that a man tried and condemned by Egbo law has to forfeit all his slaves and other property in his possession, no matter to whom this latter may belong. These are all divided as prey amongst the highest Egbo authorities. Persons sentenced to death by Egbo trial are allowed what is considered a privilege of leaving this world in a state of intoxication. There is a class of people called Bloodmen, who live in the interior at the plantations, and whose presence in Duketown does not give much comfort to the Egbo authorities. Sometime after the death of King Eyamba in 1846, a number of slaves belonging to the duke’s family ran away from their owners, and entered into a blood covenant for mutual protection. In a short time others joined them, and they now amount to several thousands. The present King of Duketown, Duke Ephraim, is the lineal descendant of the master of the original refugees, and consequently has considerable influence over them. Some time back they tried to be allowed the establishment of a separate Egboship for themselves, but were refused. They come into town whenever any ceremonial is to be performed having reference to a deed of blood; but what their relation is to the Egbo order still remains a profound secret. The gentlemen at Old Kalabar have all private fetishes at their houses—the skulls of human beings, the bones of leopards, hippopotami, crocodiles, and manattis, arranged according to the owner’s taste and fancy. Peculiar species of food are not eaten by many families, from the fact that some members of them die after eating of such condiments, and their ju-ju consequently places an interdict on their use.

At Lunda, another settlement in Western Africa, the individual at the head of the State is called the “Mambo.” This gorgeous personage, together with his chief ministers, is thus described by the traveller Valdez, to whom audience was given:

“The Mambo sat on a number of tiger-skins, so arranged that all the tails radiated, thus forming the figure of a large star, and in the centre was spread an enormous lion-skin, which covered a portion of all the others. A stool, covered with green cloth and placed on the lion-skin, formed the throne of the Mambo. This dignitary was dressed in a most magnificent style, far surpassing in grandeur of display all the other potentates of the interior of Africa. His head was adorned with a mitre, about two spans high, in shape resembling a pyramid, and formed of feathers of a bright scarlet colour. His forehead was encircled by a diadem ornamented with a great variety of valuable jewels of great brilliancy; a sort of frill or fan of green cloth, supported by two small ivory arrows, was standing up from the back of his head; the neck and shoulders being covered with a kind of spencer or capuchin without sleeves. The upper part of this cape was ornamented with the bottom of cowrie shells, under which was a row of imitation jewels. The lower part had a most brilliant and dazzling effect, in consequence of a great number of small mirrors, or square and round pieces of looking-glass, being tastefully arranged alternately with the precious stones all round it. His shoulders, breast, and back, were thus covered with a garment at which no one in that resplendent sunshine could for one moment look fixedly.

“The arms above the elbows were ornamented with a band of cloth of about four inches broad, the borders and edges of which had attached to them strips of skin, with hair of about four or five inches long hanging down like a fringe. None but the Muata Cazembe, or prime minister, and his nearest relatives are allowed to wear this badge of royalty. From his elbows to the wrist the arms were ornamented with sky-blue stones, while the yellow cloth, something similar to the Highlandman’s kilt, extended from the waist to the knees. This garment had two borders of about four inches wide, the upper one blue, and the lower red.

“He also had a kind of girdle or swathe of several yards long, which was worn in a rather peculiar manner; one end of it being fastened to the other cloth by a small ivory arrow a little below the waist, and the whole then wound round the body in small regular folds. A leather belt which is girt round the body preserves this garment in its place. Both are considered as the insignia of imperial authority.

“The insipo or girdle of hide is cut from the entire length of an ox’s skin, and is about five or six inches in breadth. When the insipo is girded on, the tassel of the tail is left trailing under a sort of fan, formed by the folds or plaits as before mentioned. The Muata Cazembe had hung from his insipo under his right hand a string of pearls, to the end of which a small bell was attached, which, knocking against his legs as he moved, rang at intervals. He had also pearls strung round his legs from his knees downwards, similar to those he wore on his arms. While the whole of his body was thus richly ornamented, his face, hands, and feet were left entirely uncovered.

“The Muata Cazembe had seven umbrellas, forming a canopy to shelter him from the sun. These varied in colour, and were fastened to the ground with long bamboos, covered with stuff of different hues manufactured by the natives. Twelve negroes simply clad, and each of them holding in his hand a nhumbo’s tail, were stationed round the umbrellas.

“The nhumbo is an antelope about the size of a three-year old ox, and of a chestnut colour, having a black cross along the back, and a great deal of hair about the shoulder-blades—about the same quantity as a horse has upon his mane and tail. It has cloven feet, head and horns like a buffalo, and the flesh is excellent food. The nhumbo tails held by the negroes were in the form of a broom, and the part which served as a handle was adorned with beads of various colours. All the tails were put in motion at the same time whenever the Muata Cazembe thought proper to make a sign with a small one of the same kind, which he used himself.