RITES AND CEREMONIES. 
87 
awe, founded upon the extraordinary belief that 
the spirits of their fathers often inhabit the forms 
of the reptiles after they leave the body. This 
horrible idea is very strong amongst the Bet- 
sileo; and not many years ago a Boman priest, 
in the excess of his zeal, and to show the people, 
as he thought, the folly of this idea, visited a 
house in which a large serpent from a neighbour¬ 
ing forest was a daily and a welcome guest. 
The creature used to come to the door of the 
dwelling at regular periods of the day and re¬ 
ceive its meal of milk. It was addressed by the 
family it visited by name, and, in fact, treated 
as one of themselves. The good priest presented 
himself at the house one day just as the serpent 
was creeping up to the door. Seeing the infatu¬ 
ation of the people, he seized a stout club and 
struck the hideous beast a deadly blow. The 
whole country rose against him, however, and he 
had to flee for his life. Many of the Betsil4o 
families have small enclosures near their dwel¬ 
lings, where they maintain numbers of these 
reptiles, and regard them still as being in a way 
family connections. 
The natives are very reticent as to the prac¬ 
tices of the country in former years, and it is 
exceedingly difficult to get at the facts with 
regard to the idols which were publicly de¬ 
stroyed in 1869 by royal decree. These people 
