CHILDREN 327 



string is not severed for a full day and a night after 

 birth, but this practice is certainly not followed by 

 the Wa-Nyungwe or Wa-Sena, but as soon as it 

 is done, the child is thoroughly oiled all over. 

 The father is not allowed to see his offspring for 

 a period varying from three to eight days, during 

 which time it is carefully tended by the mother's 

 ministering attendants. Should, however, the 

 infant be in any way deformed, it is taken away 

 into the forest and killed, either by strangulation 

 or else by being buried alive. In the case of twins, 

 which are regarded with great horror, I believe 

 that in many, if not in all cases, the second child is 

 at once put to death. Prematurely born children 

 are almost invariably thrown into the river, or into 

 water of some kind, and are not buried. I never 

 heard of a case of the birth of triplets. 



The small children from three to twelve months 

 old, by which time they can run about with great 

 confidence, and are in that as in other respects 

 much more forward than the infants of European 

 parents at a similar age, roll about among the 

 fowls and ducks in a state of complete and happy 

 nudity. When it becomes necessary to transport 

 them from one place to another, they are carried 

 on the mother's hip, or on the small of her back, 

 bound to her person by a shawl or a piece of calico. 

 Under the shadow of the eaves of the huts they 

 are nursed, and petted, and played with by their 

 mothers and maternal relations until they shriek 

 and crow with delight, for the native mother, in 

 spite of the statements of some African writers, 

 is, in many cases, an extremely affectionate parent, 



