Salutations—Sneezing—Land is communal—River rights—Slaves and their position—Laws of inheritance—Sons given as pawns—Masters’ responsibility—Debtor and creditor—Rules for collecting debts—Rules for fighting—The evening meal—Dividing food—Greediness condemned—The village dance—The impromptu song—Its effect on various people.

Rudeness, discourtesy, and lack of sociality are greatly condemned by the Boloki, and will be punished in longa, or the nether regions to which their spirits go after death; hence they are very punctilious about saluting each other whenever they meet, visit, or pass one another. The following are their principal salutations.

Morning:

Olongo O! You are awake. Answer: Nalongoi O! I am awake.

Obimi O! You are out. Answer: Nabimi O! I am out.

Later in the day, when a man is passing a neighbour’s house, he will say to the one sitting inside or outside his house:

Ojali O! or Ol’ o moi O! You are alive (exist or sit), or, You are there. Answer: Najali O! or Nal’ oni O! I am alive, or I am here.

If the resident sees the visitor first he says:

Oy’ oni O! You have come here. Answer: Nay’ oni O! I have come here.

If the visitor stays chatting for a little time, he says on leaving:

Nake O! I go. And the other responds: Oke O! You go.

If a man is ill he is greeted thus:

Okeli boti O! You are a little better (bolau is understood).

After his illness the greeting is: Okeli bolau O! You are good, i.e. You are better. And the answer to the first is: Nakeli boti O! I am a little better; and to the second: Nakeli bolau O! I am well.

To leave out the O! is for the greeting and response to lack cordiality, and the emphasis on the O! and the tone in which it is uttered are indicative of the feeling those greeting one another have for each other. Bwanda is the word used in greeting a superior, and the answer is Bika (these words have lost their meaning); but a superior greets an equal with the same salutations as an inferior does an equal, i.e.: Ojali O! Obimi O! Oy’ oni O! etc.

There is another salutation used by a person to an equal, the answer to which is very various; and, in fact, every person has his own reply according to his circumstances and the way in which he thinks his neighbours regard him at the time. One man greets another by saying, Losako, Blessing on you; and he replies, Ngai nkumbaku, I am one who is cursed, i.e. the people in the town are always cursing him, or he fancies they are. Or the reply may be, Bansina, They hate me, i.e. the folk in the town do not like him; or Ngai nsu ya mai, I am a fish, i.e. Everybody likes me just as everybody likes fish; or, Nakalela bana ba ngai, I am weeping for my children, said by one mourning over some great misfortune or bereavement. A vain person arrogates to himself a phrase indicative of his egotism, while a despondent one uses a sentence that does not truly reflect the attitude of his neighbours towards him, although in his humility he may think so.

There is a curious saying after one has sneezed, viz. Ngai nya, motu mosusu, “It is not I, but someone else,” and this is accompanied by a vigorous clapping of the hands and snapping of the fingers, expressive of great astonishment. It means: I am surprised that you want to call away my spirit (the spirit is supposed to escape through the nostrils), I really am not the person you think I am, but somebody else.

The natives are fond of water, and bath frequently during a hot day; and children are bathed regularly twice a day. A mother takes her infant to the river, and, gripping it tightly just under the right armpit, she dips it beneath the water. And after holding it there many moments, she will lift it out, and just as it regains its breath to start crying, down it will go again. This is repeated about a dozen times, and then rubbing the superfluous water off with the palm of her hand, she holds it out in the sun for a few moments to dry. Riverine people can remain under the water for a long time while attending their fish-nets, and this habit they have gained from those infantile experiences, when it was either holding the breath, or drinking a quantity of dirty river water.

They wash their mouths both before and after meals, and generally carry a native tooth-brush (a piece of cane three inches long and frayed at one end) about with them, and use it frequently during the day. To this habit they probably owe the beautiful white teeth so usually found among the natives. Both men and women occasionally pay a hairdresser to comb out their hair nicely, and plait it into three plaits—two standing out at right angles to the temples and one standing out above the forehead. They also frequently rub their bodies with palm-oil and camwood powder, and will sometimes blacken their eyebrows.

The land surrounding a town belongs to the people who live in the town. Certain landmarks, as streams, forests, etc., are agreed upon as boundaries. If there is a town near the boundary the land reaches right up to the boundary of the next town, but if the town is some distance from the forest boundary, then the ground between the boundaries is neutral land in which the folk of both towns can hunt, cut timber, etc., as they please. Within the boundary the people of the town are free to make their farms and build their houses where they like, provided the land is not already occupied by someone else. Priority of occupation is the only title recognized. There is no such thing as unclaimed land. It is either within the boundary and is claimed by the town living on it, or it is between the boundaries and is for the benefit of the near towns as neutral hunting, etc., but no one can sell that land without the consent of those towns that are mutually benefited by it.

If a slave belonging to a man of the town cultivated a piece of land owned by her master’s town, she had full rights over it, and her master is careful to see that those rights are not infringed. Of course, she cannot sell the ground, but she can sell the farm as a farm and the stuff growing on it, and the person who buys the “stuff” can continue to cultivate it, if she is an inhabitant of the town owning the land, if not, she can let the produce mature there, and when she has removed the said produce the land will revert again to the town.

Men, women, and children can own, for the time being, the land that they have cleared for farming purposes; and can own slaves whom they have bought or inherited. I have known a case in which a slave owned a slave, and that slave—the property of another slave—owned a slave also. When we bought a piece of land in 1890, the price given was divided among the head-men in the town according to their importance, and they gave a part of their shares to their followers—members of their family, but not to their slaves. The State told us we could take the plot of land we wanted for nothing; but we recognized the natives’ rights in their land, and thus paid them compensation for relinquishing those rights to us. If we had not done so, the natives would have regarded us as interlopers who had stolen their land, and I think their view would have been the right one.

The river running by the land belonging to a town is the joint property of the townsfolk for fishing purposes. People of other towns are not allowed to fish there. There are, however, large tracts of neutral water where anyone can fish with trap or net, provided no one else is fishing in that spot. These fishing rights are so well recognized that men never think of fishing along our bank without first seeking our permission.

Slaves can be sold by their owner; and they can also be killed by their master, and no one can prosecute him for murder—he has simply destroyed his own property, and “surely a man can do what he likes with his own goods.” Slaves are, as a rule, treated well, for they can easily run away, and their owner will then lose the money invested in them. It is to the owner’s interest to look properly after them—to house them, to provide them with wives or husbands, and maintain their rights as members of the community. I have known some few slaves run away; but I have known more than a few to be treated like members of the family. The better the slaves are treated, the more secure are their masters of their services and value.

The eldest son takes his father’s title, and also inherits a larger proportion of the property than his brothers. The amount depends on the number of sons—if there are three sons, the eldest takes a half, the second son two-thirds of the remaining half, and the last son the rest. The property of a woman goes to her husband, and, failing him, to her own sons, or daughters. The sons of a free woman take priority over those by a slave wife. On the Upper Congo father-right is the rule, whereas on the Lower Congo mother-right is the recognized native law.

Sons inherit their father’s widows, and in sharing them out it is arranged for a man not to have his own mother as a part of his share of the women. The son, on becoming possessed of his father’s widows, can either keep them as his wives, or, if they are slave women, he can sell them; and if they are free women he can arrange for them to marry someone else, and keep the marriage money paid for them.

Failing direct male heirs, the daughter (or daughters) takes the estate; but she gives the wives to some of her near of kin, such as male cousins, etc., but should there be no direct male or female heirs, the family clan takes possession of the estate and divides it among themselves.

When there are male heirs, and the estate is divided up, the daughter (or daughters) takes as her portion the women who were given to her father as her marriage money by her husband; and these she gives to her brother by the same mother as herself, so that that brother receives his share of the estate as a son, and also the women (if still alive) given as a marriage portion for his sister. In recognition of this gift the fortunate brother will make frequent presents of sugar-cane wine and meat to his sister’s husband, as this increment to his wealth has come indirectly from him.

Slaves number about 25 per cent of the population. Some were born slaves, others were seized for debt, a few were captured in war, and some had sold themselves to pay their debts, incurred by adultery, or by the loss of a lawsuit, the expenses of which they could not meet. Some were sold to pay the family debts. It is also the custom for a father to give a son in pawn as security for a loan. The status of a pawn is somewhat higher than that of a slave, for he may be redeemed at any moment, and thus again become a free person. The one who holds such a pawn cannot sell him, nor pass him on to anyone without the consent of the pawner, for the family may arrive with the redemption money, and if the pawn cannot be produced the pawnee will have to pay the family three or four times the value of the pawn.

There are no absolutely independent men and women apart from head-men and chiefs. All the rest are attached to head-men as relatives, slaves, pawns, or by a voluntary surrender of themselves to a chief. If the family of a free man dies off, or becomes very weak—too weak to defend itself against the aggressiveness of the other families in the town, such a free man attaches himself (and any relatives dependent on him) to the head-man of any one of the stronger families he may select. He then practically becomes a member of that family. Their quarrels are his, and his quarrels are theirs. His position is that of a free man owning fealty to the head of his adopted family, and he is never treated as a slave. If he had tried to stand alone in his weakness some quarrel would have been picked with him by one of the more powerful families, and eventually he and his would have become slaves. A slave is called mombo, from omba, to buy; a pawn is ndanga = a token; but a free man who attaches himself to a chief is called ejalinya, probably from jala = to live with.

A slave boy is not permitted to use either camwood powder or oil on his body; but should he please his master one day by bringing him a present of a fine fish, or a large piece of meat, or some cloth and brass rods worthy of his master’s acceptance, his owner on receiving the offering will rub his hands over his slave’s face, and say, “Your skin is very bad. Why don’t you rub it with camwood powder and oil?” and from that time he is allowed to use the cosmetic so prized by all the natives.

As a rule the best dressed men in a town are the slaves, and the worst dressed men the masters. They are afraid to parade their wealth for fear of charges of witchcraft on account of deflecting other folk’s goods to their own store; and also a man can more consistently and more easily refuse a loan on the plea of poverty, in old clothes, than he can if he is gorgeously arrayed. Of course, on special occasions, the masters will wear plenty of good cloth, and decorate their bodies with powdered camwood and oil. A slave can dress his hair like a free man; but if he has a beard he must leave it loose, for only free men are permitted to plait their beards.

The master is responsible for the actions of his slaves. I remember a case in 1892 when a slave attempted the life of the head-man of his master’s town. His attempt failed, and he escaped to a distant town; but the master was tied up, killed, and eaten. It is not at all improbable that if the master had been a more influential man some other way would have been found to meet the case—a heavy fine—as the attempt was unsuccessful. While theoretically a master is liable for his slave’s debts, yet he will repudiate them on the ground that the lender had no right to advance goods to a slave without first ascertaining whether the master will be responsible for the payment for them or not. A slave badly treated by his master breaks the eboko, or fetish saucepan, belonging to a witch-doctor. Then the witch-doctor demands such a heavy price from the master, as he is responsible for his slave’s action, that he prefers to leave the slave as compensation in the witch-doctor’s hands to paying such heavy redemption money. The sum demanded is usually more than the price of a slave; but public opinion is very pronounced against a slave who breaks the eboko for insufficient reasons. The fear of this has a strong deterrent effect on bad, passionate-tempered masters in restraining them from ill-treating their slaves.

Labour is not regarded as a degradation, and those who are skilled in smithing, canoe-making, etc., not only become comparatively wealthy, but are regarded with great respect on account of their skill. Boys like to accompany their fathers on fishing and trading expeditions; and girls go with their mothers to the farms as soon as they can walk, and toy hoes are given them to play with while on the farm. These journeys to the farms or to the fishing camps are a change to the young folk, and are much enjoyed by them.

Among the Boloki there are neither markets nor market-places. If a person has anything for sale he walks through the town calling out its name like a London hawker. Sometimes a person catches a fish that is taboo to him, and he will hawk it through the town to try to exchange it for another that he can eat.

In their business transactions credit is frequently given, and for such credit no interest is expected. To recover a debt a creditor first duns the debtor until he is tired, then he breaks the pots and saucepans, and anything he finds outside the debtor’s house, and finishes by telling him that on a certain day he will call again for the money. If the debtor then fails to pay, the creditor will collect a few of his friends, and together they will go and lie in ambush near the farms until a wife of the debtor comes along, when they will pounce upon her and take her to their town. The woman will kick, struggle, and scream for the sake of appearances; but she knows that she will be lightly tied and well treated.

The debtor will hear of the capture of his wife, and, supposing he owes 1000 brass rods, he will collect the money as quickly as possible, and take it with 500 extra rods, which he will now have to pay to his creditor to compensate him and his friends for the trouble of tying up the woman and the cost of feeding her. As a woman is worth nearly 3000 rods, it pays the debtor to redeem his property by paying his debt and the sum demanded for expenses.

If the debt is for 1000 rods the creditor may tie up one woman, but if he ties up two women he puts himself in the wrong, for the value of one woman more than covers the debt and expenses. If the debt is for 3000 or 4000 rods, the creditor may capture two women, and so in proportion to the debt. It is very seldom that a woman is seized for any sum less than 500 rods. If the debt is not paid within a reasonable time, the creditor can keep the woman as his wife, or if she happens to be a slave, he can sell her. If the debtor has no wives, then a member, or members, of his family can be seized on the same principle as shown above. Sometimes a creditor will tie up a person belonging to the town of his debtor; but this is rarely done except in cases of hostility between the towns. These debts are generally incurred either in buying a large canoe, or a wife, or in losing a lawsuit.

A village may have from twenty to five hundred huts in it, and even more. The rows of houses are generally built in parallel lines to the river; and a head-man possesses one or more lines, according to the size of his family or clan. He may have many wives, slaves and their wives, “pawns,” and dependents, and consequently own several rows of houses; or he may be the eldest of several brothers who with their wives, slaves, etc., jointly own several rows of dwellings. The former head-man is a greater man than the latter, he has more prestige in the town, and has greater influence in its palavers, for such a man is the head of a powerful family, each unit of which may number more than the brothers, their wives, and slaves put together.

The mboka = village, town, locality, may consist of from 20 to 150 families, numbering anything up to 2000 or 3000 people, or it may mean only one or two families not numbering more than 50 or 60 people; but it does not matter how large or how small the mboka is, it is independent, self-governing, and recognizes no over-lord. There is the head of the family, whose word is law to his own relatives and immediate dependents living in his section of the town. Then there are the heads of the families who meet together to arrange the affairs of the town, and to decide on any course of action in relation to the neighbouring towns. Some are heads of larger and richer families than others; and such men necessarily have more influence, and their words carry greater weight than the utterances of poorer and smaller men. The lives of the people are rendered pleasant, or otherwise, according to the temper and ambitions of these head-men.

The various families forming a town live, as a rule, at peace with each other; and if there is a dispute they try to settle it by “holding a palaver.” But if the quarrel develops into a fight, then sticks are the weapons used, as guns and spears are rarely, if ever, brought out in these miniature “civil wars.” They combine as a whole against a common foe.

The family that causes the quarrel leads the van in a war, and if only the offended family attacks the offending family, the other families of the offender’s town stand armed ready to defend their dependents and property, should the offenders prove unable to repulse the attack. But if the offended family brings the several families of its town to attack the offenders, then the other head-men and their followers will join to repel the attack, for it is no longer a quarrel between two families of different towns, but a fight between town and town. Thus a family combines to fight a family, and a town to fight a town, and I have known one case in which a district joined its forces to fight a district.

The evening meal is practically the only meal of the day, and every effort is made to render it as tasty as possible with the limited ingredients at the disposal of the woman cook. Cassava figures as the principal article in every menu; and for this meal it is commonly prepared by soaking it for three days, and then after peeling, coring, and dividing it into quarters, it is steamed, and comes out looking white and appetizing. Either fish, or meat when procurable, is stewed in a small saucepan or roasted over the fire, or wrapped in leaves and covered with red-hot embers; but if there is neither fish nor meat, then a sauce of pounded leaves, red peppers, and palm-oil is concocted, and the whole is washed down with gulps of water. They prefer to keep sugar-cane wine for their drinking-bouts and for their cannibal feasts, the latter, in their view, demanding something better than water.

The food is served first to the elders (male), and if visitors are present they take precedence according to their age. As a rule the members of a family are polite to one another, and any departure from the usual forms of courtesy is regarded with disapprobation by the other members of the family. Guests are treated with hospitality, and are protected by the family they are visiting; and I never knew a guest come to harm during a visit. Men and women do not eat together, as it is accounted immodest and indecent for a woman to eat with a man; and it is infra dig. for a man to partake of his food with a woman. They eat by themselves at some little distance, and usually out of sight and hearing of the men.

In dividing food, such as meat or fish, the one who divides it takes the portion left after all the others have selected their shares, and in this way they have a guarantee that all the portions are equal in size and quality. If a saucepan of fish and another of cassava are put before five or six persons for them to eat, no division is made, but all help themselves from the same saucepans, yet each will be very careful not to eat more than his fair share. But when a fish, or a lump of meat, is given to half a dozen men, or women, they appoint one to divide it into six lots, and the one to whom this very doubtful honour is given is careful to make all the lots equal—in bone, flesh, and fat—for he knows that the others will choose their portions before himself. Any greediness is condemned, and if persisted in others will refuse to eat with the offender, and he becomes an object of ridicule to the rest of the family and in the village.

The following story, which I often heard related around their evening fires, will well illustrate how the natives regarded any greediness about food:

“Mokwete possessed a large number of wives; and one day he made a trap and eventually snared an animal which he carried to his town and told his wives to cook. When they had cooked the meat they took him his share, and reserved a portion for themselves. Mokwete ate his meat alone, but it did not satisfy him, for having so many wives the portion of meat that fell to him was rather small.

“By and by he killed another animal, and he said to himself: ‘I kill plenty of animals, but get very little meat for myself, because my wives are so numerous.’ When he reached the forest near his town he disguised his voice and shouted: ‘Wives of Mokwete, wives of Mokwete.’

“They answered, ‘E!’ thinking it was a spirit calling them from the bush.

“Then he said: ‘When your husband comes with meat, you must not eat any of it; if you do, you will die.’

“In a little time he picked up the animal and went on to the town. The women cooked the meat and brought it all to him. He asked them why they had not taken any of it, and they told him what they had heard from one of the bush spirits. Mokwete ate all the meat, was well filled, and congratulated himself on the success of the ruse. He repeated this trick again and again.

“One day Mokwete’s son went into the bush, and while there he heard the sound of someone coming, so he hid himself. In a little time a man arrived and threw something with a thud to the ground, and then he heard a voice say: ‘Wives of Mokwete, wives of Mokwete, when your husband comes with meat you must not eat it; if you do, you will die.’

“The lad, on looking out, saw that it was his father who was deceiving his mothers, and keeping him and the other children from having their proper share of the meat. He hurried home and told his mothers all that he had seen and heard, but they disputed his word. However, one of them went to look, and saw that it was really the husband who had been telling them not to eat the meat. She went and told the others, and they decided to run away.

“While Mokwete was out hunting one day, his wives broke their saucepans, put out their fires and fled; and upon reaching their various towns they told their families why they had left their husband—on account of his greediness—and everybody justified them.”

Now Mokwete would return to a fireless hearth, an empty village, and no one to cook for him and wait on him. And I have heard the folk snap their fingers, and say: “Mokwete was well punished,” and there was no one to pity him. “When a man buys a fish or a piece of meat he should share it with the wife who cooks it for him; and when he kills an animal he should share it with all his wives.” The children received their share of meat or fish through their mothers.

While the hearth is the centre of a woman’s family life, for her children (if she is fortunate enough to have any) will gather around it at sundown to watch the bubbling saucepans on the fire, and her husband may occasionally be found there playing with his youngsters, or chatting to his wife, yet the dance is the real centre and expression of the social life of the village. Is there a death? Then relatives and friends will show their sympathy, not by sitting around talking over the good qualities of the departed, but by dancing their best and chanting the praises of him who has so lately gone to that mysterious longa, or nether regions, where all spirits find their home for a time. And standing round the funeral dances will be the whole village, applauding the agile or chaffing the awkward. Is there a marriage? Then relatives and boon companions of the old bachelor days are invited, and after the feast a dance is arranged, and although some of the legs will be unsteady, through too much sugar-cane wine, yet all present, both dancers and spectators, will be in a jovial mood.

On moonlight nights the drums will be brought out, reed rattles, ferret bells, and anything else that will tinkle, will be tied around the ankles, the men and women will form lines opposite each other, and for hours the dancers will jump, twist, and wriggle to and fro in the most approved fashion to the tap, tap, or boom, boom of the rhythmic drum. All distinctions are forgotten for the time being. The skilled and the unskilled, the poor and the rich, the slave and the free, are all mixed in indistinguishable confusion. It is the best dancer, be he poor and a slave, who is the cynosure of all eyes and the object of all their praises. And as the dance proceeds the dancers sing in unison some recitative song, while the onlookers keep time to song and dance by clapping their hands and swaying their bodies to and fro.

The greedy man, the coward, the thief, the scamp who disregards the feelings of others and rides rough-shod over the social and communal customs, the man who is accused of witchcraft and refuses to take the ordeal, and the incestuous, are all put into the songs which are sung at these village dances; and there is no more powerful factor in influencing the native to good and evil, inciting him to reckless bravery, or deterring him from committing some foolish deed, than to put his name into an impromptu song at a village dance. The paragraph in our newspaper is read by comparatively few people, and only a small percentage of those who read it know the person mentioned; but the song is sung, night after night, by all the village—the very neighbours of the one thus held up to ridicule or honour. The village song inspires the daring deeds in time of war, it brands and shames the cowards, it considerably restrains the rascals, and maddens to the verge of suicide the fool who so badly treats his wives that they run away and leave him a cold hearth by which to sit.