WITCHCRAFT. 347 



the Fetissist, who peoples with malevolent beings the 

 invisible world, animates material nature with evil 

 influences. The rites of his dark and deadly super- 

 stition are all intended to avert evils from himself, by 

 transferring them, to others : hence the witchcraft and 

 magic which flow naturally from the system of demon- 

 ology. Men rarely die without the wife or children, 

 the kindred or slaves, being accused of having com- 

 passed their destruction by " throwing the glamour over 

 them;" and, as has been explained, the trial and the 

 conviction are of the most arbitrary nature. Yet 

 witchcraft is practised by thousands with the firmest 

 convictions in their own powers ; and though frightful 

 tortures await the wizard and the witch who have been 

 condemned for the destruction of chief or elder, the 

 vindictiveness of the negro drives him readily to the 

 malevolent practices of sorcery. As has happened in 

 Europe and elsewhere, in the presence of torture and the 

 instant advance of death, the sorcerer and sorceress will 

 not only confess, but even boast of and believe in, their 

 own criminality. " Verily I slew such a one ! — I brought 

 about the disease of such another!" — these are their 

 demented vaunts, the offspring of mental imbecility, 

 stimulated by traditional hallucination. 



In this state of spiritual death there is, as may be 

 imagined, but little of the fire of fanaticism : polemics 

 are as unknown as politics to them ; their succedaneum 

 for a god is not a jealous god. But upon the subjects 

 of religious belief and revelation all men are equal: 

 Davus becomes OEdipus, the fool is as the sage. What 

 the " I " believes, that the " Thou " must acknowledge, 

 under the pains and penalties of offending Self-esteem. 

 Whilst the African's faith is weakly catholic, he will 

 not admit that other men are wiser on this point than 



