This beautiful and fertile country produces abundance of palms, from which they obtain a great quantity of oil: this they are very fond of, and use in their cookery. It is with this oil also that they anoint their bodies and heads; they even besmear their clothes with it: they are, consequently, very filthy, and smell of palm-oil to a great distance.
They wear nothing but a pagne round their loins; and though they have all the materials for clothing at hand, they will not take the trouble to use them. They wear a copper ring suspended from the cartilage of the nose, and ornament their ears with several rings of the same kind. The women have no other ornament than a few beads.
These people are considered thieves by their neighbours; and yet they are very hospitable, which seems scarcely compatible with the vice of which they are accused. They never see a stranger without inviting him to share their repast, and it would be almost an insult to refuse them; they consider it as a kind of contempt, and are much hurt at it. They are warlike, and are often at war among themselves. Whole families sometimes fight to settle their own quarrels, or even those of their ancestors. They are armed with poniards, and defend themselves very skilfully against the blows of their adversaries with large shields made of elephant’s hide. I have been assured that they are not accustomed to make slaves, but kill their prisoners without mercy.
The Bagos have no king; each village is governed by the oldest of the inhabitants, who settles their disputes, though they have, like the Landamas, a Simo, who performs the functions of chief magistrate upon important occasions.
They are a jovial people, and fond of drinking; persons of both sexes often assemble round a large calabash of palm-wine, and do not leave it till it is empty. They are great eaters, and their diet principally consists of dried fish, swimming in palm-oil, which renders it so disgusting, that a European could not touch it. When they kill a sheep, they mix the skin and entrails, unwashed, with the stews which they make: they also eat snakes, lizards, and the monkeys which they catch.
The Bagos never visit their neighbours, neither have they occasion to do so, for their own country produces abundance of every thing requisite for the subsistence of any really temperate man. They cannot imagine that any nation is better off, and believe themselves superior in every respect to all others. I could not gain any information as to their ideas of the Deity; that they have some idea of a Supreme Being, however, is certain; for when they hear thunder they dance and sing, to a drum, and say that God is rejoicing, and that they rejoice with him.[43]
Their houses are large and convenient; many families live together, and the members of each sleep upon the same bed; with the exception, however, of the head of the family, who has a bed to himself. The women never eat with the men; each has her own dish and eats in private; the boys also eat by themselves. The men are very good swimmers, and they have canoes made out of a single tree, which serve them for crossing from one island to another.
The Bagos are quite black, with curly hair; they shave the front of the head, and let the hair grow at the back; anointing it with palm-oil, which makes it look very much like sheep’s wool. When the men go to Kakondy on business, they put on trowsers and a European hat; but, as soon as they return, they lay this costume aside, and resume the pagne.