Chap. V. LEGEND OF FOUGAMOU. 107 



watches it constantly, wandering niglit and day- 

 round the Falls. Nagoshi, the rapid above, takes its 

 name from a spirit said to be the wife of Samba, as I 

 have already stated. 



A legend on this subject was related to us 

 with great animation by our Aviia guide, to the 

 following effect: In former times people used to 

 go to the Falls, deposit iron and charcoal on the river 

 side, and say, " Oh ! mighty Fougamou, I want this 

 iron to be worked into a knife or hatchet " (or what- 

 ever implement it might be), and in the morning 

 when they went to the place they found the weapon 

 finished. One day, however, a man and his son went 

 with their iron and charcoal, and had the impertinent 

 curiosity to wait and see how it was done. They hid 

 themselves, the father in the hollow of a tree, and the 

 son amonG:st the bouo'hs of another tree. Fouo-amou 

 came with his son and began to work, when suddenly 

 the son said, " Father, I smell the smell of people ! " 

 The father replied, " Of course you smell people ; for 

 does not the iron and charcoal come from the hands 

 of people?" So they worked on. But the son again 

 interrupted his father, repeating the same words, 

 and then Foucramou looked round and saw the 

 two men. He roared with rage, and to punish the 

 father and his son, he turned the tree in which the 

 fiither was hidden into an ant-hill, and the hiding- 

 place of the son into a nest of black ants. Since 

 then, Fougamou has not worked iron for the people 

 any more. 



The sky being cloudy all day, I could not take 

 observations to fix the latitude of the rapid, Nagoshi, 



