Chapter XVIII

THE SIN-KWAIN,[150] OR WATER-SPRINKLING CUSTOM.

This ceremony follows closely upon the So-sin, or Horse-tie rites. All the Dahoman kings are interred, I have said, in the palace of Agbome, where their graves are in different buildings. The King, however, must repair to the several abodes of his ancestors in the order of their succession, and he usually sleeps five to eight nights in each house. The ghosts of the old kings are induced to lend their aid in present wars by their tombs being sprinkled with water; which in Dahome means, of course, blood, and that blood, human.

On January 9th, 1863, the King, after “giving water to his father” in the Komasi Palace, passed about nightfall with loud singing, drumming, and firing, to the gate of Aho, in the Agbome House. This monarch, the Adahoonzou I. of our histories, is the second of the list, being the son of Dako (Tacoodonou), the Romulus of Dahome. Yet he is preferred before his sire in all rites and ceremonies, Dako being looked upon as a mere captain, Aho as the founder of the capital, and the originator of the gong-gong beaters, or heralds. There is a legend that he made during his father’s life a public assertion of royal dignity, by committing the offence which Ahitophel prescribed to Absolom.[151]

On the present occasion the King was hurried; during this moon of the last year he had set out on his campaign; he therefore passed, after the second day, to the old Dahoman palace, where the same pious rites were performed for Dako (Tacoodonou), and Akaba (Weebaigah), the third king. Wishing to see the ceremony, which is not usually shown to strangers, I spoke to the Buko-no, who sent a message to summon us at 2 P.M. We were accompanied by Mr. Dawson, the ex-missionary. Having once been detained eighty-five days at Agbome by the present King, who is worse than his father,[152] he had sent so many excuses to the royal invitation, which here are commands, that all expected to see him brought up by force. Setting out from the north-western corner of the Agbome Palace, along the broad road which surrounds it, we met at that hot hour few of the bell-ringing she-slaves that usually infest the thoroughfare. It led us to the north side of the royal enceinte, which is upwards of a geographical mile in circumference; here a rough fence of palm-mats and a humble entrance denoted the place where a clay wall and a barn gate would be built, and called after Zoindi, the King’s mother. After passing another mean entrance, we came to that of Senunmé, mother of Agongoro, the usual sloping shed backed by the swish wall, which here became continuous. A few paces beyond it was the Porte of Agontimé, mother of Gezo, distinguished by a perpendicular line of ten skulls set in the outer face of the wall, and four horizontally disposed in its depth at right angles to the door, to which a single cranium was nailed. This gate opens to the north-west, upon a cleared space, with fine sward, dotted with thick-shaded trees; on both sides of the entrance are figs, and beyond this “Green Park” rises a clump of dirty mat huts—the Ajyahi market. Here, on alternate years, the Human Sacrifices of the Platforms are performed by the King, who throws to his subjects cloths and cowries, captives and criminals. Two stages are erected for this tragedy, one, the Akhosu Atto, or King’s Platform, due north of the gate; the other Addo-kpon, or the Bush King’s stage, rises a little to the west of where the market sheds now stand, clustering round a gigantic and obscene clay image of the Bo-god. At the north-eastern extremity of the green stands a national trophy, a large heap of granite stones, brought, one by each soldier, from the hill fort of Kenglo,[153] when “Ho-ho”—Mr. Duncan—was insulted, and which Gezo, his host, razed to the ground. Further lies Abiji, the Potter’s Field of Dahome, where thick smoke may often be seen in the morning.

Beyond the Ajyahi market, the Green Park, and the Potteries, are two gates, bearing the name of Chai, mother of Tegbwesun (Bossa Ahadi), and near it a small entrance where pots made in the palace are exposed for sale. Ceramics are here in the same condition as Palissy found them three centuries ago throughout Europe. The material, clay, glittering with mica, is brought by women from a neighbouring water called Diddo, and is hand-made; the wheel, as usual in Africa, is unknown to the skilful Zen-men-to,[154] who are not, however, confined to the palace. The smaller fictile wares fetch seven to fifteen strings, the larger water-jars half a head, or one shilling each, and the price rises high at Whydah. They are under-baked, and of unequal thickness, therefore of extreme fragility, and the roads are strewed with their débris.

Near the palace-potteries houses crowd upon the outside wall, which has another gate; from this the royal women go forth to fetch wood and water: it is also provided with two exterior sheds, under which men shelter themselves when waiting. The seventh entrance has a large barn, called after Ahwanjile, mother of Sinmenkpen (Adahoonzou II.), and beyond it at the north-eastern corner of the enceinte is that of Addono, mother of Agaja the Conqueror, fronted by a fetish shed, resting upon two mud columns, chequered with whitewash and grey-black.

Here we turned off to the left,[155] where a very torn and tattered swish wall showed us that we were at the Dahome Palace, the cradle of the royal family. Opposite the entrance was a small open space, and behind us on to the south was the palace of the Min-gan, who, like the Meu, has the charge of victims and state prisoners. From where our chairs were placed, little was to be seen,—two humble thatch roofs, and a pair of silver or plated imitations of birds, peering above the old enceinte; sounds were heard inside, and at times we were passed by men beating together solid bars of iron and blowing through the four-holed flageolets, here called Pwete.[156] After sending in vain sundry messages to the King, we became wearied of the _séance_, and returned home to make a serious “palaver” with the “landlord.” His excuse was that the sovereign had been pronouncing a long speech, which could not be interrupted. I imagine that Gelele does not wish strangers to see the nakedness of his old palaces, or the thinness of the company in them assembled. Perhaps the presence of the victims may have something to do with the exclusiveness.

The following is an account of the “Water-sprinkling” rites, given to me by an eye-witness. The victims on each occasion are said not to exceed two, and I have heard of the King judging one hundred and sixty, and dismissing all without capital punishment. The tomb is approached with animals of all sorts, from a bullock to a pigeon, with water, rum, kola nuts, and many minor things. Whilst the ministers and captains are, like the King, on all fours, the Dahoman form of kneeling, before the tomb, a Tansi-no priestess, of blood-royal, offers up to the Ghost a prayer for its living descendant’s long life and prosperity, and all of the ancestral shades are invoked at each palace. She then pours water and rum upon the grave, which is afterwards sprinkled with the blood of men and beasts, then and there killed. The non-human meat is finally dressed, and a “tavo,” or table, is “spread,” the stool of the deceased being placed upon it as an emblem of his presence, and meat and drink are strewed upon the mats around it. This part ends with a general distribution of the provisions—the royal portions being sent inside the palace. Mr. Bernasko described the ceremony, which he was permitted to see, as follows: An enclosure of cloth surrounded the stool, or some similar relic of the departed; a Tansi-no woman entered within it and prayed; and lastly, the King, after performing his orisons, sprinkled on the ground, to the right of the throne, rum, water, and native beer. It is said by some that the monarch drinks a glass of blood at the Dahome Palace, but this sensational report is highly improbable.

On January 14th, Gelele proceeded to the Agrin-go-men House, and watered the grave of the great Agaja Dosu, who received a pair of victims. The next day saw him at the palace of the King Tegbwesun (Bossa Ahadi), outside the western walls of Agbome, in a place called Adan-do-’kpo-ji Daho.[157] He then removed to the Lisehunzo[158] or House of Sinmenkpen (Adahoonzou II.), which lies north of its neighbour, and separated by fields which abound in partridges. Both are approached by a poor gate in the city enceinte, called Sikpo. During the firing which accompanied these pilgrimages, several accidents occurred. On the evening of the 16th, the King returned to Bwe-kon, a kind of village, near the Komasi Palace, where there is a Kwe-gbo, or old and bush-grown enceinte, belonging to Agongoro (Wheenoohew), his grandfather. About midnight a servant of the Matro, whose left hand had been shattered by the bursting of the musket, awoke us with loud and piteous cries of Ye-e-e-gé[159]! Dr. Haran had treated an Amazon for the same accident, and Mr. Cruikshank had excised a tumour from the forehead of another soldieress; neither of these had uttered a groan. The King showed as much anxiety for the man’s hurt as if he had been a caboceer. The wrist bones being shattered, and the thumb hanging by a strip of flesh, Mr. Cruikshank proposed an amputation. Having ascertained that we had no chloroform, and determined that without such medicine so terrible an operation could never be endured by man, the King refused his consent, and the Buko-no removed the thumb and dressed the wound after his own fashion. This piece of conservative surgery was by no means successful, the man dying, probably of suppuration, a few days afterwards. Finally, on January 19th, the King returned with great noise and tumult to his father’s palace of Komasi; and so ended the “water-sprinkling” custom of 1864.

At the risk of repetition, I must again refer to a curious fixed idea in England, absonant withal, touching human sacrifice at Dahome. It is no mere lust of blood nor delight in torture and death that underlies the rite in these lands. The King has to perform a disagreeable task over his ancestral graves, and he does it; his subjects would deem it impious were he to curtail or to omit the performance, and suddenly to suppress it would be as if a European monarch were forcibly to abolish prayers for the dead.

[Footnote 150: Sin (water), kwain (sprinkling). This is generally called giving water to the spirits of ancestors, and Commander Forbes writes the word, See-que-’ah-hee (_passim_).]

[Footnote 151: Josephus (lib. 7, chap. 10).]

[Footnote 152: The captivity of a visitor at Agbome is complete. Europeans usually begin to talk of leaving on the day of their arrival at the capital, or the people will be persuaded that the whites desire to remain.]

[Footnote 153: Or Kengro, the Koglo of Mr. Duncan (vol. ii. chap. 3). Ho-ho means a tall man.]

[Footnote 154: Zen (pot), men (person, or making?), to (one that does).]

[Footnote 155: Passing Addono’s Gate to the right we find a deep angle in the palace wall, where water is poured out to King Aho (Adahoonzou I.), at an entrance called Patin sa, “near the Patin-tree.” Beyond it an avenue of pollarded trees, leading to nothing, encloses a long and large ridge, such as were turned up by the hoe in the good old times: it is still kept as a model. Further eastward, and going under the usual “Vo” gallows with a central mat, we come to the Han-ho-nukun-ji Gate, where Agaja the Conqueror’s palace begins. The next building of any importance in the enceinte is the Agrigomen Gate, which, like the whole of the southern and south-western side, has been described in chap. x.]

[Footnote 156: The word is a corruption of the Fanti “ketí.” It is an artless reed, open at both ends, with a little notch in the mouth-piece, which is scraped thin to divide the wind. Mr. Dalzel remarks (Introduction, p. 11) that “the King’s women understand and practise the combination of the perfect concords, thirds and fifths,” and that their little airs, played upon the flute and other instruments, are not inelegant. Dr. Bowditch describes “the soft breathings of the long flutes” at Ashante as being “truly melodious.” Dr. M‘Leod (p. 96) finds the _flageolets_ of Dahome very sweet, and in the next page gives the following sample of an air:—

[Music sheet]]

[Footnote 157: Meaning Adan (brave), do (live), ’kpo (high place), ji (he stops or lives). Daho is great. Some call it Adan-do-’kpo-ji Khe-sa, from khe (a kind of tree), and sa (under).]

[Footnote 158: Lise (a tree before described), and hun-zo, a kind of fetish.]

[Footnote 159: In Fanti, Mewo! or megyá!—“My father!”]