Chapter V: A Funeral Orgy

Satu becomes chief--Preparations for the funeral feast--My box is
opened--I become a neck ornament--Bakula, my new owner, is smart,
but superstitious--The mourners assemble and present their
gifts--The toilet before eating--Drunkenness and quarrelling--Corpse
is carried to the grave--A white man wants to steal the ivory
trumpets--He is shaved and sent about his business.

As the deceased chief was a very great man it was necessary to postpone his burial for a month or two until fitting arrangements for a grand funeral could be conveniently made, otherwise his spirit would not be satisfied, and trouble would follow.[10] Moreover, if the chief had been hurriedly buried like an ordinary man, the whole countryside would have accused the family of meanness and selfishness in wanting to keep the dead man’s wealth for themselves. Therefore the body was dried, wrapped in a cloth and placed in a hut built for the purpose.

Footnote 10:

See note 8, p. 345.

Satu sent to all the markets day after day for miles round, buying up every goat, sheep and pig that was offered for sale. Having collected a large number of animals he then began to send out invitations to the funeral ceremonies. It was decided that on the eighth _nkandu_[11] market day the rites should begin. All messengers sent to chiefs with an invitation had to take with them one or two goats, according to the chief’s importance, “to feed them and their followers on the journey” to the mourning town.

Footnote 11:

See note 9, p. 345.

At the commencement of these preparations my box, in which I had travelled so far, was opened, and I should have been sent with many other brass rods to the markets in exchange for goats or pigs; but a lad took a fancy to me, and begged to give an old brass rod in my place. My new master, whose name was Bakula, turned over my two ends, and, hooking them together, he wore me round his neck as an ornament, and as he polished me brightly every day I was well able to see all that happened about me.

My new owner was a free-born lad of high spirits, alertness and agility, quick at all games, successful in all kinds of sports; but like many of his seniors, held the women and girls in great contempt except when he wanted a favour, and then he could cajole and flatter them until their eyes sparkled with pleasure and they became his slaves. He was, however, very superstitious, had many charms tied about his person, and regarded the “medicine men” with great awe and admiration. Bakula quite believed that his success in hunting, his smartness at games, and his general good fortune were entirely due to his charms and the regularity with which he made sacrifices to them.

The appointed day for the funeral was drawing nigh, so the preparations were pushed on apace. Large quantities of cassava flour[12] were prepared and an immense number of _kwanga_[13] loaves were bought at the different markets, and demijohns and calabashes of palm-wine were ordered for the three days’ feasting that were to precede the interment.

Footnote 12:

See note 10, p. 345.

Footnote 13:

See note 11, p. 345.

The eventful day at last dawned, and during the morning and early afternoon chiefs with retinues of wives, followers and slaves were constantly arriving. They came from all quarters and entered the town by all the roads leading to it. Bakula seemed to be ubiquitous, for he greeted most of the chiefs as they entered the town, and led them to where Satu was sitting in state to receive his guests. Those of humble origin knelt before Satu and paid homage to him; those of exalted position received homage from him; and those who were his equals sat down on a mat, and solemnly, they and Satu, clapped their hands at each other.

Every chief, head man, and invited guest brought a gift of cloth “to wind round the corpse,” and as soon as the salutations were over the cloth was presented, piece by piece, to Satu. The present was supposed to be in proportion to the giver’s social position. A chief who on account of his importance had received two goats with his invitation would be expected to give three times the value of the goats in cloth, and if he fell short of this he was considered mean; but if he went beyond it he was regarded as a generous, wealthy man, and his name would be in the mouths of all the mourners, and he could strut about puffed out with pride.

This cloth, though given ostensibly “to wind round the dead chief,” was really used to defray the expenses of the feast; and happy was the family which had no crushing debt left at the close of such festivities. Satu carefully noted the value of every gift, and although he could not write, yet at the close of the day he could have told from his well-trained memory the number and quality of every piece of cloth given by any chief.

Nearly three hundred people had gathered to the funeral, either by direct invitation, or in attendance on their husbands, their chiefs, or their masters. It was just at the beginning of the dry season, consequently all the cooking and eating was done in the open streets; and those who could not find a house in which to sleep considered it no hardship to spread their mats and sleep in front of the houses.

Soon after sunset the ordinary folk gathered round the fires watching the women cooking, while the chiefs and head men sat in groups gravely talking local politics or loudly boasting of their prowess in bygone hunts and fights. No cloths were laid for the feast, and no tables were set and decorated. Everything was in primitive style. Their fingers were all the cutlery they possessed, and their loin-cloths were substitutes for serviettes.

Just before the food was served boys and girls went round with calabashes of water, and each guest took a large mouthful, with which he washed his hands, mouth and teeth in the following manner: Having taken a large mouthful of water, the operator ejected some of it from his mouth in a gentle stream on to his hands, which he washed quickly and vigorously. With the remainder of the water he cleaned his teeth by putting the index finger of his right and left hand alternately into his mouth and rubbing them; then, throwing the residue of the water about in his mouth to rinse it, he spat it out. Lastly, drying his hands on his loin-cloth or on a bark cloth, he completed his toilet preparations for dinner.

It was an amusing sight to see scores of men sitting on their haunches and gravely squirting water on their hands. The puffed cheeks, filled with water; the intent looks, and the care shown to aim the jets of water straight so as not to waste any, made a humorous picture on my mind. How simple and how effectual was the operation! I found that this habit of washing hands, teeth and mouth not only preceded each principal meal, but was also repeated after the meal, and largely accounts for the beautiful, healthy teeth possessed by the natives.

By now the food was cooked, and the women were turning it out into every kind of receptacle they could find--wooden dishes, tin plates, baskets, saucepans and washhand basins were all requisitioned. The guests broke up into groups of from six to ten persons; and each group received a large vessel of smoking vegetables, and another of steaming meat and gravy.

At once the fingers were dipped in, and he who could bolt his food the quickest got the largest share of what was going.[14] Vessel after vessel was emptied, and stomachs visibly distended in the process; but at last operations became slower and died away in grunts of satisfaction.

Footnote 14:

See note 12, p. 346.

I noticed that the men and boys ate by themselves, and the women and girls by themselves. In fact, it was considered beneath his dignity for a man to eat with a woman; and boys of ten would receive their portion from their mothers and go and eat it with the men. As a rule the women had what was left by the men, or what they could successfully hide from them. During meals little or nothing was said, as each diner thought eating was more important than talking.

At the close of the feast the old men sat in groups talking and drinking palm-wine. Now and again voices were raised in angry quarrels; for as wine entered, prudence retreated; grievances and jealousies were remembered, revived and wrangled over again, and some of them had to be forcibly restrained from fighting.

The younger men and women, hearing the drums resounding with their rhythmical beating, went off to dance in the moonlight, and the drinking and dancing continued far into the night; pandemonium reigned, law and order were forgotten, and the stars looked down that night on a town that had changed into a pig-sty.

These orgies lasted three nights. Through the day the men lounged about, sleeping in the shade; the women did no work, but simply gathered firewood and water for cooking the evening feasts. During the day no regular meals were taken, but the folk ate bananas, or roasted plantain, or a few peanuts, or stayed their hunger on sugar-canes--all, by fasting, were preparing for the night’s feasting.

On the evening of the fourth day, just at sunset, the corpse was carried to the grave for burial. The bearers took it first round the town, and pretended that the corpse was reluctant to leave the town so they had to struggle with it to the burial place, and there they buried it with its feet to the setting sun, and its head towards the east.

As the corpse was carried by the houses of the principal men they came out to greet it, and fire their guns in a parting salute to their late chief; and after that farewell from the town the funeral guns were loaded and fired in quick succession to inform the spirits in the great, mysterious forest town that an important man was coming.

The Lower Congo natives always buried at sunset for this reason: During the daytime their own towns are deserted, because the women and girls go to the farms and do not return until the afternoon; and the men and boys go to hunt or fish, or work in the forest, or trade on the markets, and do not return until the evening. Hence the old, the sick and the children only are left in the town; consequently any one arriving during that time would find few, if any, to greet them; but if the traveller reaches a town between five and six o’clock the folk will have returned from their various occupations, and at every step he will be greeted by the people. They think that the great forest town of spirits is conducted in the same way, and to ensure a welcome to the deceased they bury him just before sunset with much firing of guns, blowing of ivory trumpets, and beating of their drums.

Just as the burial rites were completed a white man, a State officer, arrived. He was greeted, and a house was cleared out, swept and given to him for the night. The white man walked freely about the town that evening and enjoyed the hospitality of the people. He watched the dances, listened to the native band composed of ivory trumpets and various drums, and was free to go and come as he pleased. In the morning he repaid their hospitality by demanding the ivory trumpets from them.

This unreasonable request the natives refused to obey; a fracas ensued followed by a scuffle, during which the officer was securely tied.

One party of the natives wanted to kill him and pour his blood on the grave of their buried chief; but another, and stronger, party resisted this extremity, wishing only to punish him for trying to enforce an unjust demand. Finally it was decided to shave the man’s head, beard, moustache and eyebrows and send him off.

When the officer’s head and face had been reduced to the smoothness of a billiard ball--native shaving is not a gentle process--he was allowed to proceed on his way a sadder, and, perhaps, a wiser man. I heard that ever after that encounter with the natives he heartily and thoroughly abused them to his compatriots, but he carefully left out of the account his attempt to steal their ivory trumpets.

The Congos have a proverb that runs thus: In a court of fowls the cockroach never wins his case; _i. e._ the verdict of one race against another is to be received with caution.