The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1888-06-29

SHOCKING CUSTOMS STILL IN VOGUE IN
WEST AFRICA ATROCITIES STILL
PERpETRArED IN AsuANrEr. .l

IL is in west Africa that the perso-
nal customs" still survive Ia all their
horrors, says AZ The Year rouud.
Again and again an English trader or
traveller has had to look on at these
"customs" but the horrors were never
fully described until 1873, when the
German missionaries, Bounst, Kuenne,
aud Ramseyer, were prisoners in Coon
assie at the time of the native princes
death. As soon as he was seen to be
dying the executors began to scou, the
streets for victims. When they caught
anyone two would come behind and
thrust knife through the cheek the
blade passing over the tongue, and
a handle sticking out on each side.
This is to prevent the poor creature
from swearing on the life of the king"
i e., swearing that il he dies, the
king must die, too--in which case, in
stead of being killed, he would not
only be spared, but ranked among the
"okra' courtiers whose life depends on
that of the king, and who--killed when
he dies-hold till his death places of
trust and honor.
Besides those caught, every great
chief had to offer vctim but the num-
Der was chiefly made up of slaves and
prisoners of war. The wives-painted
white, and covered with gold orna-
ments--sat round the coffin, Tapping
off the flies They were strangled at
the funeral. SO were six pages, who
similarly painted and adorned, sat by
the dead man. They had known
their fate some DAYS before, but none
ran away, save three wives of low
birth, whose places were at once sup
piled by other girls. For nine days
the slaughter went on, the people fas-
ting, with shaven heads and bodies
painted red, but drinking all the more.
And his death wake was to be repeat
ed forty days after
When king dies the victims are
slain at the rate Of two hundred week
for three months. But there have
been 'greater customs" than these. A
kiug's mother died IN 1916; her son
slaughtered three thousand people, two
thousand being prisoners just captur-
ed from the Fantis. To make up the
tale every big Ashantee town had to
give one hundred, every smaller town
ten victims.
Aroyal burial is on this wise: At
the bottom of huge grave are laid
the heads of the slain; on them the
coffin rests. Then, Just before the
earth is thrown in, one of the bystand
ers--a freeman, if of some rank 50
much the better-is suddenly dubbed,
a cash made in the back of his neck,
and he is rolled in upon the coffin.
The idea is to send along with the
crowd of slaves and prisoners some one
who shall look after them as aghostly
''maior domo.'
For king there remains yet anoth-
er s'custom. At the end of thirty
moons the grave is opened, the royal
bones fastened together with gold
wire, and the skeleton placed in long
building divided into cells, the door
ways to which are hung silk curtains.
Then on his birthday the king of
Ashantee goes early to the house of
the royal dead. Every skeleton is Ia
ken from its richly ornamented coffin,
where it has laid surrounded by the
things that had been most pleasing to
it in life, and is placed on chair to
welcome the visitor. As the king en-
ters each cell with meat and drink
offering to the departed the band
PLAYS the favorite melodies of that par
ticular king, aud, unawares, the royal
visitor sings to the executioners who
have followed him, and an attendant
is pierced throughed the cheeks and
killed, the king washing the skeleton
in the warm blood The same work
goes on at the next cell, and so on,
the fearful work going OH far into the
night. Two blasts of the horn mean
death, DEATH" three drum taps, "cut
it off, one beat from big drum, ''the
head has fallen" The signal is taken
up by other bands, and all through
the city horn-blowing and drum-beat-
ing goes on increasingly. The Asian
tees always says of drum, sit speaks"
and every traveller admits that they
manage to elicit from that unmanage-
able instrument most varied range
of sound. The sounds form words,
the whole rhythm a sentence, readily
understood by the native listeners.
Each chief has his own "call,' Just as
each Highland clan has its own battle
tune. OF course, this constant kill
ing makes the people callous to suffer-
ing and brutal to their prisoners.
Their feeling in regard to to death is
not courage but apathy. The specta-
tors are as delighted at these revolving
"customs' as the Roman populace was
at the gladiator's show. Now and
then victim is tortured. The miss
ionaries watched one who, besides the
knives through hls cheeks, had coup
lie offorks thrust into bis back. He was
then dragged before the king, and
gashed all over the body, his arms
were cut off, and in his plight compel
led to dance for the amusement of the
royal savage.
All the Ashantee sacrifices, however,
are not personal. When war is i'm
pending victim is pegged down to
the ground in the shape of an y,
stakes being driven through the body,
and the poor wretch being left to die
on the war path by which the invaders
will have to travel. No native army
would pass such an obstacle; it would
turn back and cut fresh way through
the forest; and when, in 1874, we pas
sed on unheeding over body so peg
ged down along the road across the
Adansi hills, the priests came out aud
assured our men that they were doom
ed to certain destruction. If, after
that Ashantee war, we had insisted on
the customs" being given up, we
should have only been doing our duty
as human beings, not to say Christians.
1t is astonishing how the civilized
world. which professes to have the
welfare of the dark continent so much
at heart, can allow this savagery 10
go or unchecked; and how we, who
spend SO much in capturing slavers on
the east coast, most of whose cargoes
are taken over to Bombay and become
- A.. Il. okol ~ lal