Liberia <«- 



are cannibals at the present day. They are also turbulent, 

 and much given to local warfare, though not ill-disposed towards 

 the European, 



Cannibalism is widespread in Interior Liberia between the 

 Cavalla River and the St. Paul's. Mr. Reynolds states that 

 human hands are considered a bonne bouche by the Kpwesi. 



Mr. Gow states (1904) that the people to the north of 

 Sikoii or Sikombe station killed a woman whom they caught 

 in a plantation. She had her child with her at the time. The 

 captors secured the child in the village stocks near the 

 plantation. They then removed the body of the woman to 

 the centre of the village near the stocks, cooked her flesh in 

 the hot embers of a big fire, and feasted on it, staying the 

 child's crying by giving it freshly grilled morsels of its mother's 

 flesh, which the poor baby ate quite unknowingly. Women 

 who intentionally or accidentally surprise nien and boys when 

 organising their initiation ceremonies and who are incontinently 

 killed, are usually eaten as well. 



The Gbalin tribe of the Kpwesi people are reporteci to 

 be inveterate cannibals, fatteningr and devouring their war 

 prisoners and slaves. But all these people — all the indigenous 

 Tiberian Negroes — are cleanly in person and much given to 

 washing the body. The Kru tribes in the interior as well as 

 on the coast frequently take two baths a day.^ The natives of 

 the interior Cavalla Basin (according to d'Ollone) take a hot 

 bath in their houses when returning from work. This is 

 done by the simple process of pouring hot water out of kettles 

 or calabashes over their shoulders and limbs. Soap is used in 

 Western Liberia made from the lye of the leaves or bark 

 of a sapindaceous tree or also from the spongy leaves of a 



' Mr. D. Sim, liowever, states that the Putu people behind the coast Kru are 

 a dirty race in their persons and dwellings. 



952 



