Twelve months in Madagascar

by Joseph Mullens

They made Imerina and all the upper plateau their own. And here for five hundred years they settled down and spread and grew. They ate, they drank; they planted, they builded; they spun and they wove; they married and were given in marriage. They formed the iron hatchet and the iron spade. They cut down the forests and built houses, well framed, well fitted, with roofs that successfully shed the rain. They built villages and towns; surrounded them with deep ditches and protected them with the cactus hedge. They grew into compact tribes, obedient to their chief and his appointed officers. The members of the tribe met in council; and in the public assemblies, not only maintained their liberties, but developed the powers and the resources of their mellifluous language. They made war on their neighbours or defended themselves against attack: their kings cemented peace by marriage alliances. They made great feasts; and though no poetry has survived, their orators could recite the traditions of the past: and their assemblies were enlivened with the dance and the song. Great heroes arose among them, like Rapéto and Ralámbo; of whom wondrous stories went abroad.

Two hundred and fifty years ago the Malagasy not only began to be better known to the outside world, but light begins to be thrown upon their internal growth and condition. At that period we find the Arab merchants settled at three points on the coast and a foreign trade steadily carried on. We find them on the east at two points. At Mátitánana they have been settled long; they have written the Malagasy language in Arabic characters; they have taught the tribes the Arabic names of the week days and the months: but they have made no converts. As the first specimens of the rukh’s egg were dug up here, it is possible that Sindbad’s application of the old story may have been derived from some sailor who had visited the settlement. There was another Arab colony on the island above Tamatave, called by them Nosi Ibrahim: now known by the French name of I. Ste Marie. Both these settlements, owing doubtless to the Portuguese invasion of the eastern seas, were in a state of decay. The third settlement, at what is now called Mojangá, had done better: it was more easily accessible; it was nearer to the head quarters of the Arab trade at Zanzibar; it was on the lee side of the island, on a splendid bay; and both the Indian cloth trade and the traffic in slaves were carried on under favourable conditions. More than this, able men among the Arabs had watched their opportunities, had practically usurped the government of the locality, and as the Sakalavás had no cohesion, they retained their power long. At this time the trade of the Indian Ocean was breaking up. The Portuguese had built up nothing in the place of the power they had destroyed. The sea swarmed with adventurers: Captain Kyd and other English pirates made Madagascar their head quarters: and French schemers were planning and contriving settlements on the sea board, hoping in the end to obtain possession of the island.

From all these quarters the Malagasy people gained no help. Under God’s care in the quiet of the interior they were making steady progress. It is evident from their traditions that two hundred and fifty years ago, considerable strength was accumulating in the community, broader ideas began to prevail, and efforts at closer union were put forth. Ralámbo stands first in the new line of monarchs drawing the people onward. To him are attributed great advance in the care of cattle, and the establishment of the Fandroana festival. His second son, Andrianjáka, in the days of Cromwell, founded Antanánarivo, on the hill till then called Iálamánga. Sixty years later (about 1720), Andriamásinaválona, a man of large mind, brought the whole of the Imerina towns under his rule. He was a wise and thoughtful ruler, ready for great enterprises. To him is attributed the greatest engineering work yet executed in the province, the embankments of the river Ikopa, which prevent the annual flooding of the great rice plain. His name is always mentioned in public kabáries with profound respect. On his death his kingdom was broken up among his sons; but a hundred years ago, all the twelve cities were re-united under Impóin-Imérina, the ablest monarch of that princely line. The border provinces also on every side felt the weight of his strong hand: and his son Radáma, by hard fighting, long marches and untiring energy, consolidated and extended the dominion on every side. Only the south-west Sakalávas and Ikongo remained independent.

Even then, with all their growing energy, the Malagasy nation was still young. Their cities were growing; the villages were becoming numerous; and on the whole peace was maintained. But it was often broken for a time: and the hollow valleys between the royal towns were still swamps full of reeds, a protection to each city against its neighbours. The rice cultivation was extending; but an immense area of the great plain was still occupied by these great reeds, high overhead, thick, and all but impassable. It took three days to travel from the present capital to Ambohimanga, twelve miles to the north: the swamps were traversed in canoes: and enemies, with spears, might be encountered at any point, lurking in wait for prey.

In this brief sketch I cannot enter at length into the customs of these tribes. Their ancient warfare with the thin spear and round hide shield; their cylinder-bellows, and clay furnaces for smelting iron; their simple looms and spindles, have all been described and pictured by Mr. Ellis. With one thing however I was greatly struck: with their custom of giving over to the dead in their large stone tombs, the dresses, ornaments, furniture and possessions, which were favourites while they lived. And I remembered how the Malay tribes of Polynesia and the North American Indians have been accustomed to do the same. Another custom was to exhibit by rows of cooking stones, or of bullock skulls on poles, the extent to which the funeral feasts had been carried in honour of the dead, and the estimation in which they were held.

The social life of the Capital at the beginning of this century, shows in a very striking way how poor, as compared with other nations, the civilisation of the Malagasy still was. Almost no European improvements had reached them, except the fire-arms which they had obtained from the coast, and which proved a powerful instrument in securing the consolidation of the kingdom. When Le Sage visited him, Radáma was a thorough Malagasy, in his dress, his superstitions, his house, his habits. He was dressed in a lamba, and sat on the floor, to eat with his hands out of a silver dish. His people were the same; and when they met Le Sage and gave him a royal reception as the English envoy, they were covered with silver ornaments, and shouted and danced and sang around the strangers with truly barbaric pomp and show. In mental grasp and in their longing for better things Radáma and his father were much beyond all this. Radáma was a gentleman in his manners, courteous, considerate, hospitable and kind. Both kings were wise in council, energetic in action, eloquent in speech: both were humane in purpose, though in despotic harshness they were often cruel; both were truthful, straightforward, and truly anxious to improve. They were fine illustrations of the weaknesses of Madagascar, as well as of its native strength and native virtues.

Beneath the surface lay many proofs of the backwardness of the people. Life and property were insecure: there was much poverty: few incentives existed to active industry: the country was destitute of roads: systematic travelling and intercourse between the different parts of the country, was all but unknown. To me one of the most instructive illustrations of the state of the island and of the relation of its people to the world at large is furnished by an event which occurred at this time on the north-western coast. On more than one occasion at the end of last century the Sakalava tribes had taken advantage of small vessels, in calm weather, had seized them, brought them to land and burnt them for the sake of their copper and iron. Gathering together hundreds of men, they had undertaken occasional expeditions against the Comóro Islands and harried and robbed their people. But in 1816 they planned a great expedition against the fort of Ibo, near Mozambique, three hundred miles away. They gathered no less than two hundred and fifty canoes, containing 6250 men; and set out on their expedition. They were overtaken by a violent hurricane and only sixty-eight canoes reached the African shore. That was in 1816. Yet it reads like a page from Robinson Crusoe, or a story from the South Sea Islands.

I need not pursue the history. With Radáma we have reached our own times; we have reached modern efforts, modern improvement, modern missions. Often has the later story been written: it is told by Mr. Sibree in his little book, and by Mr. Ellis in his “Martyr Church” effectively and with brevity. Let us look at the people as they are. At first sight my colleague and I thought them backward: but the more we reflected on the past; on their complete isolation from the great world around them; the simple frame-work and the small attainments of their national and social life, so late as sixty years ago; the more thoroughly we appreciated the great stride in progress which they have taken in that brief period. Many officers of Radáma’s day are still living, with their antiquated coats and antiquated notions; and till very recently they have much hindered change and trammelled advance. But solid progress has been made. It has been made in their outer life. But best of all, it has been secured in far greater degree in their religious character and in their moral and social habits. Indeed it is a matter for special congratulation and thankfulness, that it is that moral improvement which has come first; and that it is so deeply rooted and so widely spread. The external civilisation will follow quite rapidly enough.

In the form of their national life, the Malagasy are still a federation of Malay tribes. Each of the greater tribes has numerous sub-divisions: at the head of which are the noble families and princes descended from the great chiefs of former ages. Among these the immediate descendants of the ancient kings of all the sections and cities of old times occupy an honoured place. The feudal rights and dignities and privileges of these noble clans are carefully maintained, as well as their feudal duties faithfully performed. All the commoner ranks of the people are enrolled and included among the clients and followers of these inferior chiefs and princes; or among the direct followers of the sovereign. All payments for taxation within the tribes are made in kind or in feudal service rendered. Officers are remunerated by lands or by the assignment to them of the service of so many inferior men. Rice, sugar-cane, lambas, firewood, beams for building, bundles of thatch, stones, pork, beef are all rendered to them and to their superiors as part of that service. Under the law of Ralámbo, the rump of every ox slaughtered in the Capital is delivered to the Queen. On a message from the Queen asking for any special form of service, local meetings are held by the clans to arrange as to the mode of distributing it. The term used to denote this system is fánampóana, which means exactly “service;” and it bears all the variety and breadth of meaning which the English word had in feudal times. Though having in it just elements, the system has many weaknesses. It bears heavily upon the skilful: it is unequal in its demands: it represses progress by taking away all stimulus to self-improvement or to individual enterprise. It keeps society on a dead level and fosters indolence and indifference. It will only be cured by a fair distribution of the services required in all grades of society, and by a commutation of the service for a fixed money payment.

In regard to legislation and general government, the Queen is the head of all the tribes. On great questions public meetings of the tribes (kabáries) are held: discussions take place, and the Sovereign pronounces the decision. The Sovereign in this way enacts all laws. But they are declared verbally by herself or some appointed officer, (as we have seen in the Betsileo) in public meeting; and the people and their representatives respond. Judges and magistrates, “heads of hundreds,” and so on, are appointed to hear cases and complaints, or to examine criminals: they sit in the open market. Many improvements are coming in to these arrangements. The laws have been codified twice by recent Sovereigns, and have been put in print. The Malagasy have now a “Prime Minister,” a “Commander-in-Chief,” and a “Chief Secretary of State,” called by the English names. And these officers, with a few others, form a kind of inner council, who consult together about public affairs. Formal receptions are held by the Court and affairs are conducted with dignity and good sense.