lo6 Seven Years in Central Africa, [June, 
aad remained behind ; but on the way her husband was killed, 
and the woman, watching her opportunity, ran away from her 
captors. After a wearisome journey of over seventy miles 
through a most dreary and desolate country, with her little babe 
on her back, she returned to the place where her boy was. 
Taking him in her arms, with all the warmth of a true mother, 
she burst into tears, saying, "Ah, my boy, you have lost your 
fither, and you do not know how near you were to losing 
me!" 
Their attachment to one another, although a beautiful feature 
in their character, is embarrassing at times to strangers ; for, on 
seeking to strike a bargain with one of them, you find you have a 
dozen to deal with. The same thing happens when one thinks 
he is injured, be he young or old. A cry is raised, and all come 
to the rescue. In this way I have seen the most serious dis- 
turbances arise out of the merest trifle. 
FETISHISM. 
The tribes we have passed through seem to have one common 
religion, if it can be called by that name. They say there is one 
great spirit, who rules over all the other spirits ; but they worship 
and sacrifice to the spirits of ancestors, so far as I can learn, and 
have a mass of fetish medicines and enchantments. The hunter 
takes one kind of charm with him; the warrior another. For 
divining they have a basket filled with bones, teeth, finger-nails, 
claws, seeds, stones, and such articles, which are rattled by the 
diviner till the spirit comes and speaks to him by the movement 
of these things. When the spirit is reluctant to be brought up, a 
solemn dirge is chanted by the people. All is attention while 
the diviner utters a string of short sentences in different tones, 
which are repeated after him by the audience. 
AN AFRICAN THOUGHT-READER. 
These professional diviners are no doubt smart fellows, arch- 
rogues though they be. The secret of their art lies in their 
constant repetition of every possibility in connection with the 
disaster they are called upon to explain, until they finally hit 
upon that which is in the minds of their clients. As the people 
sit around and repeat the words of the diviner, it is easy for 
