The Narubunu tribe consists of four towns, or villages: Buji, Gurrum, Gussum and Jengre. At the last two there is a ceremonious washing of the corpse by the subordinate members of the household of the Madaiki. (It is a Hausa word meaning the second man of the town.) Burial takes place in a large hole in front of the entrance to the Chief’s house, resembling a catacomb, which must make it quite a cheerful residence. The corpse is laid on a mat and carefully covered.
But a number of the tribes, more than are assumed, eat their dead who die from natural causes. Possibly you shudder at the thought of a corpse which came to that stage by disease being consumed for food. I admit it does not seem nice, according to our tastes and ideas, but if I am ever to be the dainty served up at a meal I greatly prefer the cannibal company having the feast through my having shuffled off this mortal coil more or less of my own volition, so to speak—by fever or other illness—rather than the diners should hasten the consummation by means of spear or poisoned arrow. If they enjoy the tit-bit, I am sure I shall not mind. The trouble, in the event of any of my friends wishing to make a pilgrimage to the sepulchre, would be locating it.
None of these cannibal gentry ever hunted or specifically killed human beings for food; certainly not in recent times.
The causes which operated to make mortal remains find their way to the cook-pot were that of the vital spark having been quenched in fight; the frame which held it put to death for an offence against the community; or that it gave up life in the ordinary way.
With tribal and inter-tribal wars forbidden and exaction of the death penalty in the hands of the supreme authority, menus in which human flesh figures are now necessarily fewer.
In this eating of the dead there is a certain etiquette. You will appreciate that the pleasure of the palate must be tinged with some sadness, or at least regret, in the knowledge that—assuming you to be a cannibal—your meal is made from the man who lived across the way or further up the path and with whom you had been on visiting terms; whilst obviously there must be some sentiment against consuming one’s near relations.
Count is taken of these human traits, and a village which indulges in cannibal luxury will exchange bodies with another village. It occurred to me that mortality would not invariably be equal between the contracting villages and I asked whether a debit and credit account was kept. The question was put jokingly, as I expected the thing would be allowed to work itself level, but I found a rough-and-ready record was kept of the village exports. An epidemic, such as smallpox, may yield quite a harvest of material to the larder—whatever the disease makes no difference to those who sit down to the feast; they are not at all fanciful or capricious—and so pile up the debt beyond chance of quittance within a reasonable period. Therefore a settlement is made at regular periods and the balance defrayed by cows or goats.
The number of bodies is not alone computed. You need not be an epicure in the business to understand that a fully-developed individual who becomes non est is, in a table sense, worth several ancient, withered carcases. All this is calculated in the settlement.
JARAWA PAGANS.