A HOVA CHURCH. 261 



bordered by bold lines and running sprays of leaves and 

 flowers. In a church at Ambohimanga the windows were all 

 surrounded by groups of palm-like trees, while on the key- 

 stones of the arches over windows and doors were painted 

 groups of flowers, many of them most tastefully designed and 

 coloured. 



I was much struck by a piece of wall-painting which 

 I found six or seven years ago in a country church some 

 twenty miles to the west of the capital. The ornamentation 

 covered about two-thirds of the wall behind the pulpit, and 

 had it been the custom in our churches to place our com- 

 munion tables " altar-wise " against the end wall, the painting 

 might have been taken for an elaborate altar-piece or " dossal." 

 There were, however, no figures, or even attempts at represent- 

 ing such natural objects as leaves or flowers, but only com- 

 binations of lines and circles, and curves and zigzags, in 

 a variety of colours. But the most noticeable feature was 

 that, both in the forms employed, and in the key of colour 

 pervading the whole, there was a remarkable resemblance to 

 the style of ornamentation which may be seen in the mediaeval 

 wall-painting still remaining on the stonework of a few of our 

 ancient Norman and Gothic churches in England. In fact 

 the whole formed an elaborate diaper, and the colours em- 

 ployed, mostly the native clays of various shades of brown, 

 buff, chocolate, and black, with sparing use of the primary 

 tints, were at a distance all blended in a kind of neutral 

 tint or purple haze. Indeed, the untaught native artist had 

 unconsciously succeeded in accomplishing what more laboured 

 attempts often fail to do. The chief difference between this 

 Hova decoration and the mediaeval examples was the absence, 

 in the former, of any distinctively sacred emblems or mono- 

 grams. But the similarity of things so far apart both in time 

 and locality struck me as curious and suggestive. 



In the different cloths which the Hova women weave from 

 silk, cotton, hemp, and other materials, a good deal of taste and 

 ingenuity are shown. In these woven stuffs stripes are largely 

 employed, and in the coarser and cheaper fabrics made from the 

 fibre of the rofia palm, the colours are obtained from vegetable 

 dyes and from various coloured earths. A very favourite style 



