THE WESTERN COAST. 
which they termed the Grandfather of the snakes. 
With the discovery of this snake at some fortu- 
nate period, the snake-worship probably originat- 
ed ; for the ancient Whidanese related, that they 
found him when he deserted another country on 
account of its wickedness. This snake-worship, 
therefore, presents no inexplicable phenomenon 
in the history of the human mind, for it resolves 
into the more general doctrine of fetiches, which 
IS only a species of the common belief in the vir- 
tue of charms. 
Dahomy is a fertile and cultivated country ; the 
soil is a deep, rich, reddish clay, intermixed with 
sand, scarcely containing a stone of the size of an 
egg in the whole country. It is extremely pro- 
ductive of maize, millet, beans, yams, potatoes^ 
cassada, plantain, and the banana ; indigo, cotton^ 
tobacco, palm-oil, and sugar are raised, as well as 
a species of black pepper. Bread, and a species 
of liquor, or rather diluted gruel, are formed of 
the lotus berry. Animals, both wild and tame, 
are numerous, and the lakes abound in fish. The 
maritime districts of Whidah and Ardra, before 
they were ruined by the Dahomans, were highly 
cultivated and beautiful. " The vast number 
" and variety of tall and spreading trees," says 
Smith, seeming as if they had been planted for 
" decoration, fields of the most lively verdure, al- 
most wholly devoted to culture j plains embel- 
