Identifier: nativesofbritish00wern (find matches)
Title: The natives of British Central Africa
Year: 1906 (1900s)
Authors: Werner, Alice, 1859-1935
Subjects: Ethnology
Publisher: London : A. Constable and Company, ltd.
Contributing Library: University of California Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: Internet Archive

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t noticeable are the little spirit-housesalready mentioned, where sacrifices are presented fromtime to time. Sometimes these offerings are seen undertrees, either in the village, or away from it—in fact, Mr.Macdonald says that the huts are erected, if there isno tree handy, close to the dead mans house. (Thehouse itself, as we shall see, is usually either pulleddown, or shut up and left to decay.) If the tree isquite outside the village, the site may have beenshifted, as often happens ; or perhaps the spirit may beone of the old gods of the land. This is possibly thecase with the tree in the illustration, which is onNdirande mountain, a few miles from Blantyre, thoughI am not sure whether this particular tree is close to avillage or not. Ndirande, like Sochi, has a spirit of itsown; and I suppose this is the reason why the boy whowas accompanying me in the ascent of Nambanga (anisolated peak or knob at the northern end of the moun-tain) showed a sudden reluctance to go on. I thought
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Trke, wnn Okikrings ro SiiRri> Til face p. 50 RELIGION AND MAGIC 51 he was tired, and told him to rest, and I would go onalone; but this seemed equally objectionable, and hewas evidently making up his mind to go with me, asthe lesser evil, when I decided to avoid the risk of in-humanity by turning back. As I could by no mannerof means induce him to explain, I suspected the spiritmight have something to do with the matter. In Mr. Macdonalds time, the chiefs of the Blantyreand Zomba villages were all Yaos, and their canonisedpredecessors therefore belonged to the same tribe ; buta certain amount of reverence was also paid to * theold gods of the land—i.e. the spirits of dead Nyanjachiefs who haunted the principal mountains, and v/erespecially appealed to for rain. We have alreadyalluded to Kangomba of Sochi, The Rev. H. Rowley,when at Magomero, in 1861, saw Kangomba in theflesh; he was then about forty years of age, had afrank, open countenance and a good head, and wasaltogether a

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