428 ETHNOLOGY. Chap. XXI. 



Grant, and Livingstone, we see that in the East the 

 chiefs are powerful, often cruel, putting their subjects 

 to death ; villages of neighbouring tribes are con- 

 tinually sacked, the cattle plundered, and the people 

 killed or carried into slavery. Property seems to be 

 secure nowhere. 



Polygamy and slavery exist everywhere among 

 the tribes I have visited ; the wealth of a man con- 

 sisting first of wives, next of slaves ; the slaves 

 always belonging to a different tribe from that of 

 their owner. 



Their religion, if it may be called so, is the same 

 in all tribes. They all believe in the power of their 

 gods (idols), in charms, fetiches or mondahs, and in 

 evil and good spirits. Mahommedanism has not 

 penetrated into this vast jungle. They all believe in 

 witchcraft — which I think is more prevalent in the 

 West than in the East — causing an untold amount of 

 slaughter. Travellers in the East have not noticed 

 it as prevailing so much as I have done. They 

 behold with superstitious fear the appearance of the 

 new moon. 



Their laws of inheritance are alike, except among 

 the Bakalai. 



The Western tribes believe in the alumbi, a custom 

 which Eastern travellers have not described, but they 

 speak of clialk, and of little houses containing jaws 

 or bones of men. 



The Western custom of the djemhai (see ' Equatorial 

 Africa '), is known under another name in the East. 



The doctors of both East and West have the same 

 powers and functions, and ai'c called by nearly the 



