HISTORY OF MADAGASCAR. 
139 
stitious practices of his people; yet such was really the 
case; though while he placed unbounded confidence in the 
idols of his country, he seemed to acknowledge some one 
supreme power, being in the habit of speaking of Andria- 
manitra, or God, as having given him the kingdom. But 
after all, so extremely vague are the ideas attached by the 
Malagasy to the word God, that it is uncertain whether the 
king meant, by the use of it, the idols of his country, his 
deceased father, or the true God. 
In working the sikidy^, or divination, Radama frequently 
presided in person, and especially in any cases of great 
importance. Charms were objects of unbounded confi¬ 
dence, equally with the monarch and his subjects, and, at 
the time alluded to, they were sold publicly in the markets ; 
a practice which was afterwards discontinued. 
The king has been represented, though without just 
foundation, as having been cruel and vindictive in his tem¬ 
per. He was not naturally of a savage disposition, but 
extremely jealous. He sacrificed neither the liberty nor 
the lives of his subjects out of mere wanton caprice; yet 
when he entertained a suspicion of any design being formed 
against his person or his government, then not the nearest 
ties of blood or friendship could avail to protect the guilty 
parties from his vengeance. In other cases, however, where 
he deemed it necessary to inflict capital punishment, it was 
from his firm and inflexible determination (imbibed, per¬ 
haps, in part from the advice and example of his father) to 
maintain the laws of his country, and to guard against the 
infraction of them, by exciting a salutary fear in the minds 
of his subjects, as the best security of the peace and pros¬ 
perity of his empire. 
Such was Radama at the time when the British nation 
formed its first alliance with him, and first induced him to 
