Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1899-10-07

fought like a fiend. and it was not until
several of them had been killed and the
oheah man himself hung in chains. with
| all his war paint on him. that the deluded
blacks saw how they had been fooled. But
the obeah man. whether he believed in his
own lamentations or not. died game, and
| told the executioner he swung him off
! that it was not in his power to kill him.
| so that the unlocking negroes We're very
much perplexed when they finally saw him
expire.
1t was because of the terrible power ex-
ercised by the priests of obeah over their
followers that the laws Of Jamaica passed
| in the last century contained two clauses
especially aimed at them.
Superstition Long Lived.
Although the blacks of the British West
Indies have been free for nearly two gen.
! erations yet they have not become freed
| from the supers titions brought by their an
cestors from Africa. Superstition. in fact.
will rather increase than diminish. unless
vigorously and constantly combated and
| this is well illustrated in the condition of
| the freed negroes today There are thous-
andSeof them who. though nominally Chris
| tians. are yet unclaimed by Obeah and de-
voted votaries of the prevailing devil wor-
| ship.
1t is strange fact that while this de-
| graded superstition hourishes amongst the
| French and British islands. it does not pre-
vail to any great extent in the Spanish as
| IN Cuba and Porto Rico. The natives of
| those islands are sunken deep in other su-
| perstftions. but they are mainly such the
| white man has fostered. and not the black.
| But 1t is in the negro island of Haiti that
| we find obeahism rampant. l have said
| that 1t is infrequently harmful in the Brit
| fsh islands; but in Haiti this cannot be af-
| firmed.
Known there under the name of the vau-
dou derived from ''vaudois'' and giving or
igin to the common ''hoodoo'') the obeah
hpS in al itS ,,riSt vic
| and is really an unauthorized form of the
African serpent worship.
The Africans of the west coast besides
| a number of deities believed in a family
deity or tutelar saint who was supposed
originally to have been one like them
| selves and the first founder of their fam
| ily- On the anniversary of this saints
| burial the whole number of his descend
| ants gather around his grave and the old
| est man of the assembage. after offering
| up praises to Accompong. Assarci Ipboa
and the tutelar deity, sacrifices a cock or a
goat by cutting Its throat and shedding its
| blood upon the grave Every head of a
household does the same. and as soon a :
| all those who are able to bring such sac
rifiees have made their oblatfons the ami
| mails which have been killed are prepared
| ana a great festival follows
| rms custom is followed out almost ex-
actly in the feasts of the Haitian serpent
% "ha or the yaudou: If you per
| chance find yourself in the great forest
| which Hes between Port au Prince and the
| mountain lake Enriduillo, and should hear
the muffed boom of the native drum or
| goombay (Which is formed by stretching
! skin over hollow log). you should nv a
| means make haste to seek Mace of safe
| W Not that the average Haitian even
| the savage mountaineer. would in cold
| biood strike you down. but If you should
| follow the sound of the drum YOU might
| run into the charmed circle of the serpent
| worshipers. and be sacrificed because of
| your temerity.
Their Priests and Rites
| THESE vaudou people have their priests
| and priestesses. whom they call the "papa
| and mama loi." and most of these are not
| only sorcerers, but also cannibals That
is. they are ritual cannlbals. and offer hu
| man sacrifices to their gods. Starting out
| with the African ceremony already men
TONED or Offering to the names of their
ancestors q cock or goat without a blem-
| ish. they have at last descended to actual
cannihalism- Assembled in the secret re-
| cesses of the forest. o small company will
work itself into a fury over the incanta-
tons OF the priest or Priestess and then
when the excitement is at its height some
| one will demand the sacrifice to their deity
| or the goat without horns" If the de-
mand be complied with. child is produced
generally white or of light compleyionl
Its hands tied behind its back At given
signal the innocent victim is ierked to the
roof of the hut in which they are assem-
bied. by a rope attached to it's feet its
throat cut and the blood eagerly drunk by
the votarfes. Then the child is dismem-
bered and dfsemboweled cast into a huge
iron pot, and when the flesh is cooked it is
devoured by the cannibaIs
These children are procured by fiends in
human shape called "Ioup garous" who
prowl about the towns and cities ever on
the watch for victims Sometimes they are
in league with nurses. who deliver their
charges TO them alive; sometimes they rob
newly made graves of children that have
been cast into a trance; but the victims are
always forthcoming. The obeah man of
Haiti is surely a monster to be feared
+. A. ODER.