LIBATIONS TO THE GODS. 
395 
the head of the male sheep or goat should be the chief 
offering, and that the skull should afterwards be re- 
tained about the person as an amulet, chiefly by the 
priests or juju men. While thus alluding to specific 
deities, we think it not improbable that the Nis-rah 
or Great Spirit of the Kriis, may have been 
derived from a complication of Neith, the god of 
wisdom, and Ra, the physical sun* ; and that even the 
Moll (idol, but sometimes used to express the Great 
Spirit) of the Edeeyahs, may have had its origin in 
the Maut- — nature or mother; and which was some- 
times I'epresented among the Egyptians under the 
form of a cat’s head, an animal — especially the Genetta 
Richardsonii, the wild cat of Fernando Po — which is 
held in deep veneration by the Edeeyahs f- 
At the religious festivals of the Copts, libations 
were poured out for the gods, and sometimes sprinkled 
about the floor ; and this is still observed among the 
West Africans, among whom we know not a tribe 
which does not make a practice of spitting out the 
first mouthful, or pouring on the ground a little of 
every fluid they partake of; and this they say is 
intended as an offering to the fetiches or jujus; and 
in their oblations to these idols, palm-wine or rum 
always accompanies the other articles of food. 
* Among the Duallas, or people of Cameroons, the word A’luba, 
signifies God, the Great Spirit, and also the Sun. 
t Vide vol. ii., p. 200. 
