Liberia ^ 



only as a testimony to the affection they felt for the deceased, 

 but in some way as an appeal to the deceased, whom without 

 reasoning very clearly they still imagine to be alive and about 

 somewhere as a spirit. The corpse of man, woman or child 

 (except in the case ot slaves) is usually exposed in public for 

 one or more days after the death (sometimes in a temporary 

 grave in the house). The women ot the family or of the town 

 spend several days in wailing and crying, and they or one or 

 two men connected with the deceased by family ties will prob- 

 ably deliver at intervals disjointed addresses to the spirit of the 

 deceased, asking him or her to declare who bewitched them and 

 caused their death, or calling on the as yet unrevealed witch or 

 wizard to stand forward and attest their innocence by drinking 

 " sauce wood." A certain amount of drum-beating or other 

 rough music may accompany these lamentations. In many 

 cases the weeping and wailing are absolutely genuine. There 

 can be no cjuestion of the agony of mind that death will cause 

 amongst these West African Negroes when the deceased was a 

 child, lover, friend, sister, brother, or parent. 



With regard to slaves, their death excites far less commo- 

 tion — little more, in fact, than if they were beasts of the field. 

 They are generally buried at night, and with no ceremony, the 

 body often being merely thrown into the forest or bush at a 

 sufficiently great distance from the village to ensure the putrefy- 

 ing remains not poisoning the air. 



In the interior of the Kru country — such as, for example, 

 the district of Sikon — if any man's wife dies suddenly and her 

 parents belong to another village, the parents make a claim on 

 the husband or the chief of his town for a considerable payment 

 as " damages " for the loss of their daughter. When the 

 amount of the payment is settled after much disputation, they 

 take no further action ; but if the husband of the deceased 



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