74 
MISSIONARY LIFE 
the case immediately on the coast — firing is 
kept up for several days after the burial takes 
place, and the wives and friends continue crying, 
or wailing, at stated times, for several weeks 
longer; and sometimes the whole town joins 
them. 
Besides these, there are professional mourners, 
whose business it is to go from town to town for 
the express purpose of mourning for the dead. 
These must also be fed, and supplied with rum if 
it can be had ; and they go about, especially in the 
night, moaning, crying, and making a most 
hideous noise. They call over the virtues of the 
deceased, often giving him more than he ever 
had, and then they cry out, Oh, me sorry too much 
for my friend ; me go hang me, me go drown me, 
me go kill me. Oh, me wish meself die instead of 
me good friend.’^ 
While I was at Good Hope Station, a man was 
employed to catch fish for the mission ; and one 
night while fishing, as is common there, one of 
those rambling, hypocritical, drunken mourning 
parties came to where he was. He drank rum 
with them until he was intoxicated, and in that 
condition he came to the house at midnight, 
waked us all up, and was intent on having a fuss. 
In Africa, as in America, when rum is in sense 
is out.” 
