Liberia <*- 



shallow, and the corpses are sometimes disinterred by animals, 

 or, in the case of chiefs, they may not be buried at all, but 

 put in rough wooden coffins with no top, and allowed to 

 decay, exposed to the air in dense thickets. A faintly fetid 

 smell rises from these places, the vegetation has a luxuriance 

 that is no longer pleasing, but diabolically lush. Nasty beasts, 

 birds, and worst of all, insects, haunt the surroundings, and 

 the visitor has a sensation that disease is in the air, even 

 though he may not be able to supply scientific reasons for his 

 apprehension. 



The graves, as above remarked, are usually shallow, from 

 two to five feet in depth throughout the whole country. The 

 grave of a chief is sometimes lined with blue and white cloth or 

 drapery of other colours. With a chief will be buried articles 

 in use by him in his lifetime, such as a pipe, a stick, silver or 

 brass ornaments, and quantities of cloth. In the countries near 

 the coast the contents of the grave — corpse and piled-up mass 

 of worldly goods buried with it — are soaked in huge libations 

 of alcohol — rum or trade gin, or, in default of anything else, 

 palm wine ; but this proceeding is discontinued amongst the 

 Vai and Gora where Muhammadanism has taken root. It is 

 probable that besides a desire to do honour to the manes of the 

 departed, this practice is also adopted in order to render valueless 

 the cloth which is thus soaked in alcohol. Most of the favourite 

 objects of the deceased that are buried with him are broken, 

 partly in order to " kill " them and send their spirit forms to 

 the Land of the Dead, and also to remove temptation from lawless 

 people who might rob the graves for the sake of the wealth they 

 contained. The grave is filled up with earth to the height of 

 several feet above the surrounding level. A number of men 

 then jump and dance on the soil, treading it down on the 

 corpe and his buried possessions till, when the job is thoroughly 



1060 



