Superstitions 
the living praying to their dead friends and in¬ 
voking their protection and blessing. If these 
friends have while living been eminent for any 
cause, sacrifices are also offered to them as well 
as prayers. Under the name of Ashu, they 
worship the devil. He is always represented by 
a hideous black image. In this case, however, 
they only deprecate, begging the fiend not to 
hurt them on a journey or in an enterprise. Near 
the landing at Abeokuta, a priestess of Ashu 
with a large image of him, sat to receive the 
offerings made by the canoemen as they were 
about to start down the river. As they think 
that death only intensifies the evil in human 
nature and increases the power of malignant 
spirits to work mischief, they live in constant 
dread of the malice of invisible enemies. 
The most terrible of their inferior deities is 
Shango, god of thunder and fire. They say that 
he was once a man, but being too wicked to live 
he was taken up to heaven and made the god of 
fire. The special devotees of this god are known 
by a tuft of hair allowed to remain in the place 
of an Indian’s scalp-lock. When lightning 
strikes a house, to them is granted the especial 
privilege of seizing any chicken, sheep, goat or 
hog that may be found in the street at the time. 
87 
