In the morning Abesula seemed to have forgotten all about the palaver, as if it were a very ordinary occurrence, as I presume it really was. We rewarded him for the house that we had occupied by a gift of a red-cap (cost, five cents), the remains of our tallow candle and six lumps of white sugar.
VIII
AFTER A YEAR
My progress in acquiring the language was greatly retarded by my long sickness, and by more than one prolonged stay at the coast. But the language is easy. At the end of a year I was conducting Sabbath services in Dr. Good’s absence and preaching in a stammering way. Mr. Kerr was speaking the language much better than I; and Dr. Good had actually translated the Gospels, though it was a tentative translation that he knew would soon need revision. We were also penetrating a little beneath the surface of native life, seeing with other eyes and beginning to realize its degradation and to feel deeply its misery and sadness.
When we three white men, on our way to Efulen, entered the first Bulu town, the old chief asked Dr. Good whether we were brothers. When Dr. Good replied that we were not, the old man, turning slowly towards his people, with an incredulous laugh exclaimed: “What a lie!” It seemed impossible that three men who were not brothers could travel together in the forest and not kill each other.
One day I heard a sudden outcry of great alarm from a village at the foot of our hill. Several men of that village were at our station at the time, and with a shout they started for home. I quickly followed them and saw as I entered the village that a tragedy had occurred. I afterwards learned that four of their prominent men had been shot. They were hunting in the forest and not suspecting danger, when another party, who were really friendly, mistook them for enemies in the dark forest, and shot all four. This is a kind of mistake that occurs frequently. The native would rather kill ten friends than let one enemy escape; so they often kill first and investigate afterwards. The village was very small and the loss of four stalwart men left them insufficiently protected against their enemies. This day the four bodies had been found in the forest and the news had just reached the village. Instantly, all the wives of those men stripped off their scant clothing of leaves, smeared their bodies with clay and running into the garden of bananas threw themselves on the ground tearing their hair and screaming, while the other women of the village gathered around and tried to comfort them. There was more than one reason for this demonstration. In part it was probably genuine grief; but there was also a strong element of fear, the fear of every wife whose husband dies from any cause whatsoever, that she will be charged with having bewitched him and suffer the penalty of death, perhaps by being buried alive with the dead body of her husband. For in this instance of the four men, it would be said, that they wore upon their necks certain fetishes that would have made them invisible to any one attempting to do them harm, and that evidently the spell of witchcraft had broken the power of the fetish. The fact that a man’s wife, or wives, are the first to be charged with his death, implying that they would be more likely than others to desire it, throws a lurid light upon their social relations and incidentally upon polygamy. The African wife everywhere is an artist in the use of poison.
In that entire year at Efulen I do not remember that there was one natural death, though we never ceased to hear their mourning for the dead. In those tribes where no degree of civilization is yet established it is estimated that nineteen out of twenty Africans die by violence. And when one comes to know the people individually and by name, instead of by impersonal figures, one realizes something of the enormity of wrong and suffering covered by this record.
One of the friendliest of the natives who had been coming to see us almost every day, a young man of splendid physique, was dragged up the hill to our door, unconscious, a bullet from an enemy’s gun having penetrated his forehead, breaking the skull and laying bare the brain. With their coarse knives they had tried to dig the pieces of broken bone out of the wound. That war began with the stealing of a woman, or rather her elopement with a man of another town. The reason she gave was that her husband was so homely she could not live with him. The man probably had no wife and had no possible means of procuring the very large dowry necessary for her purchase. The town from which the woman was stolen, according to native custom, at the very first opportunity killed a person belonging to the town to which the woman was taken. Then the other town killed several of their people. During this war the people of the more distant town could not reach Efulen, and those of the nearer town brought their guns when they attended our service on Sunday and sat with them in their hands, ready for instant action. The war between the two towns continued until twelve persons had been killed, eight on one side and four on the other. Then another woman was stolen, and another war began and this first one was settled in a great palaver, which was called in a neutral town, the people of the two opposing towns being gathered together and sitting on opposite sides of the street. After endless oratory, some of it weak enough and some of it eloquent, it was agreed that one side, having killed four more than the enemy, should pay over to them four women, and the town to which the man belonged who had first stolen the woman should collectively pay a proper dowry. Having thus agreed they returned to their respective towns and it remained only to name the four women who should be given over to the other town. Dr. Good and I were present when the old chief, after taking counsel with the elders, named the four women. The whole town was assembled. As he pronounced each name there was a shriek and a woman fled to the bush; but a number of men knowing the name beforehand, caught her, dragged her back into the street, while she struggled and threw herself on the ground as if she were trying to kill herself. But it was useless. They bound them with bush-rope and they were taken away. Upon reaching the other town, they would become the wives of the chief, or others upon whom he might magnanimously bestow them. My impression is that at first they are usually regarded with ill-will. Sometimes, when a woman seems not to be reconciled to her lot, her feet are put in stocks until she is brought into subjection; but in time she submits to the inevitable and makes the best of it. I have known instances among the Fang where such women were regarded as slaves.
Yet in all their degradation there was still something childlike about them. We found them always interesting and even lovable; and though so far below our own moral level, our sympathy was not repelled by their degradation. One upon the mountain top may seem far above his fellows; but, when he looks up, the infinite stars are equally above them all. The higher our ideals the more lowly our hearts, the more sane and broad our sympathies.
It ought not to be expected that we would accomplish any individual or social transformation in a brief year. Only with length of time can even a divine religion, so long as it leaves men free, transform the customs of ages, and in minds knowing only animal desires, create new and noble ideals. Without doubt the new truth that we taught had become more intelligible and above all, they grasped its practical import. We not only preached but practiced justice, honesty, truthfulness, and kindness (to their amazement), and they interpreted our creed by our practice. For they themselves were preachers of righteousness before they ever heard of the white man; but it was in doing that they lacked. We felt at the end of the year that they understood us, and recognized our moral principles as right: and this was a great advance.