C. W. Hobley

“ The African is a receptive person, but has little persistence, and is apt to become weary before he is efficient. There are altogether too many young men about with a mere smattering of education which is nothing more than a surface veneer, and is often used as an excuse for escaping manual labour; this spirit needs to be vigorously combated. Very few natives leave the mission schools with anything more than this surface veneer of education, the outward sign of which is a passion for khaki coats, boots, collars and ties, and in this way they ape the European. ”

“ It is noticeable that among African tribes a woman never owns live stock, and probably never did, even in matriarchal times.
The women are largely responsible for the handing on of the folk lore of a tribe and undoubtedly teach it to their children, as is done in Europe to-day. The men, however, often unconsciously help in this, for at a friendly beer-drinking gathering elders will recount folk tales, out of the stores of their experience, to the assembled company, and one tale will remind someone of another and he will try to cap the previous story by one more wonderful. ”

“ The fear of revenge must, indeed, have been the chief preventative of crime, as it has been at all times before the State became the public avenger. Mere compensation could certainly not have acted as a deterrent to crime any more than it could to-day. We have therefore, in reinstituting the settlement of crimes by payment of compensation only, not made adequate provision for the prevention of crime, nor have we been able to revive fully the old native organisation by leaving out the fear of private revenge. ”

“ A neighbour calls at the village early next day, and is surprised to find the door of the hut and of the cattle kraal open, one or two cattle missing, and the people still asleep.
Women often fashion little clay images of men and hang them up in their gardens to frighten youngsters who go there to pilfer the crops; the children believe that if they take anything they will be stricken with a thabu. The elders, however, declare that such charms are only a sham, as the women do not really wish to harm the children, but only to scare them. ”

“ In the event of a struggle, the European, having sole control of munitions, will not eventually be worsted, but he will not re-establish domination until much blood, both black and white, has been spilled, and both sides will emerge from the struggle with bitterness and distrust. ”

“ But the elders of what may be termed the “high place” are believed to have a clear conception of it, and their deity is apparently of the kind which can be influenced and appeased by material attentions. The belief in ancestral spirits—ngoma or aiimu—is the predominating spiritual factor in the minds of the great majority of the people. These are ever present, and the relations between men and spirits are in accordance with the actual patriarchal state of society. The spirits must not be ignored, for are they not of the blood kin? If neglected, they will be angry and punish their children. ”

“ When a man dies, the eldest son gives one bull or a big male goat (according to his means) to the athuri ya kiama for a feast, and the elders then teach him his duties (kirira) . The next step is to give the elders a male sheep (ku-hukuria) , which must not be eaten by the children, the object of this being to cleanse the village of the deceased. Now if a son has not made these gifts nor gone through the necessary ceremonies marking his succession, he cannot participate in the sacrificial feast which has to take place at the sacred fig tree after the death of an elder (called ku-hoya Engai) . ”

“ They saw Europeans shot down and even bayoneted by enemy black soldiers, they realised that very few Europeans were crack shots, they noted the inferior marching capacity of the white man, his inability to find his way about in the bush unaccompanied by a native guide, and in some cases they even saw that the courage of the white was not greater than that of the black. After all this can it be wondered that the prestige of the white race has suffered in the war! Is it surprising that the attitude of many of the blacks to the white man has altered? ”

“ The elders then each take a little of the sheep’s fat and rub it on their staves, saying, “We are glad that the man who defied our orders has now obeyed it; we cursed him through our mithegi, but we now smear our mithegi with fat, as a sign that we and our mithegi are glad, and there is now nothing to be feared, for we have come to cleanse you and your village from evil.” ”

“ The burden of life falls heavily on the African woman, and she is, as a rule, only too pleased to welcome a new wife to share her burden of work.
Several cases have been observed of women worrying their husbands to take a second wife, and a senior wife will often lodge a new wife in her hut until she becomes settled down in the village and her own hut is ready. There are doubtless quarrels, but, on the whole, the family lives in amity and it is believed that jealousy in the European sense does not loom very large ”

“ In practical life few things are so dangerous as abstract ideas, and the indiscriminate application of them to concrete realities is one of the most fatal weapons in the hands of the moral or political revolutionary. ”

“ The idea of sacrilege is very marked. If, for instance, an impious person cuts a portion of a sacred tree, dire results are believed to ensue, and the elders make the offender pay a ram and a male goat. These are sacrificed at the tree, and the elders apply a strip of the skin to the place where the incision was made in the tree and anoint it with fat and the tatha or stomach contents. The breast of the ram is cut off and hung in the tree, and the remainder of the carcase and the whole of the carcase of the goat, eaten by the elders.
No beast or bird can be killed or shot in a sacred tree. ”

“ The cult of the smith does not appear to be as highly developed in Ukamba as in Kikuyu, for his powers are more limited; he wears no mark of his trade, and he does not dedicate the weapons he forges, as is done by the Kikuyu smiths.
If, however, a man steals a smith’s stone anvil or any tool from his smithy, the smith can curse him by saying: “So-and-so has stolen my anvil, and I curse him, and if he eats this season’s food he will die,” and it is firmly believed that the thief will die before the harvest is reaped. ”

“ The thahu is, however, in nearly all cases removable by the elders and medicine men for payment, and it may therefore be urged that the belief has not much value as a moral restraint. This view cannot, however, be seriously maintained for the following reasons: Take the case of a person who commits an act which he knows will bring thahu; it must be clearly understood that he never questions the validity of the principle; he goes about with the burden of the misdeed on his conscience, and this worries him so much that he gradually gets thin and ill, and puts it down to the thahu. ”

“ If a man murders his cousin on his mother’s side of the family, the father of the murderer collects fifty sheep or goats, and pays them to the head of the family of the deceased, and the recipients usually kill an ox which is eaten by both parties; the elaborate ritual described above is not observed because of the blood relationship which exists.
If a man kills his brother or sister by the same mother there is no compensation—the case very rarely arises; the father would, however, kill a sheep and make his children eat it together. ”

“ He says that sometimes when rain does not come he is accused of stopping it, but that such accusations are due to ignorance, as he is merely the unconscious and involuntary agent for utterances from a Supreme Power, and that all he can do in such cases is to take a sheep to a sacred fig tree, sacrifice it there, and pray for rain, just like any other elder who is qualified to do so. ”

“ If at child-birth any blood falls on the floor of the hut, the old women who assist at the birth dig up the earth floor at that place and bury the soil in the bush at some little distance from the village, for if a goat licked that particular spot it would die.
If a man goes into his hut at a birth or after it has taken place, and accidentally treads in blood which may have dripped on the floor, the newly born child will become sick, but the evil can be averted by the cohabitation of the parents. ”

“ Among the up-country people who come into intimate contact with Mohammedan life, such as those who come to coast towns to work, it is readily embraced, for it becomes the religion of the cooking pot. The Swahilis and such like are hospitable folk, but may not eat with unbelievers, and it is therefore very expedient for an up-country stranger to become nominally a Mohammedan, for he may then dip his finger in the food bowl with his hosts. ”

“ The elders will not recognise that a claim has been paid unless it was made good before a kiama, and this is the only proof that it was paid. Natives will therefore not pay debts out of court, as it were, and this principle is often erroneously taken to mean that they will not pay debts at all unless forced to. If the council imposes a fine, it is paid to the Government. In almost all cases, however, a goat or two must be paid to the elders, who are allowed to keep them on the understanding that such fines must be consumed by them. ”

“ The Dying Curse
This is a very interesting belief, which occurs in both Kikuyu and Ukamba. In Kikuyu it is called kirume, and in Ukamba kiume. The belief is also said to be found, under the name of ukuongo, among the Ja-Luo Kavirondo.
It is really a thahu, thabu, or makwa which can be suspended by a dying man over his descendants. The same idea, somewhat inverted, exists among the Swahili, who call it rathi, or the dying blessing. If a man does not receive his father’s blessing, he is believed to go through life attended by much misfortune. ”

“ Close to Kyambu there lives a medicine man of the name of Kamiri wa Itherero who is said to be one of the most renowned of all Kikuyu. Like most medicine men, Kamiri is possessed of more character than most of his countrymen, and this is shown by his manner and appearance to a far greater extent than is usually the case among other natives. He is one of the few members of the senior generation of Maina, which in itself is a claim to veneration; this means that he has practically withdrawn from the council of elders, and that he must be a man of considerable age. ”

“ The man then proceeded to crawl down the porcupine burrow, and having crawled a long way found himself eventually, to his surprise, in a place where many people were sitting about cooking food by a fire. They asked him what he wanted and he told them of his errand. They then invited him to stay and eat with them; he was afraid and said he could not stay as he must go back with the spear which he saw lying there. They made no effort to keep him, but told him to climb up the roots of a mugumu tree, which penetrated down into the cavern, and said that he would soon come out into the upper world. ”

“ A woman becomes mysteriously possessed; the medicine man cannot account for it. A woman who understands the affection is therefore called in and orders the appropriate dance to be performed. The performers become worked up and wildly excited, and many of them become affected and the disease spreads, although the afflicted person for whom the dance was convened may be cured. When the people are worked up to a pitch of frenzy, the leader of the dance then demands a bullock, beer, and a goat from the head elder, and these are consumed by the performers. ”

“ To sum up this brief survey of a complex question, it is desired to impress upon all that the future of the African native and the nature of his relations with the white race will not be decided by the academic recommendations of any body in England. The utmost that philanthropically minded opinion can demand is a high ethical standard in native administration, and the safeguarding by government of native land rights. Further, the well-meaning people at home must trust their own people in Africa, trust to the growth of a tolerant and humane local view of the relationship of black and white. ”

“ There is a total absence of religious intolerance about this cult; failure to worship or failure to contribute to a sacrifice brings its own retribution, and the spirits are swift in detecting a delinquent. ”

“ The magic of the smiths was always feared by them. When this clan made spells to withhold the rain it is said that they were careful not to let the fields of a smith suffer.
If a medicine man visits the village of a smith he does not sleep in one of his huts, but lodges in the goat hut, thengira; a smith does the same if he visits the village of a medicine man. If a Mweithaga passes a smithy when it is raining he cannot enter to take shelter.
A woman cannot enter a smithy unless she is a smith’s wife, and she can then come to bring her husband’s food. ”

“ If a child touches the ground at the time of its birth it is considered very unlucky. A ram, a mwati (young ewe) or an arika (young female goat) is killed, and a bracelet made of the skin is placed on the mother’s wrist. This is done for the sake of the child. The skin of the animal sacrificed is used for carrying the child on its mother’s back.
It is again very unlucky when an infant cuts its upper teeth first, but the child is not killed, and is merely sent to its maternal grandmother. This only refers to those belonging to the Kikuyu circumcision guild. ”

“ The reality of this aspect of Kikuyu life and thought may easily be under-estimated, but it is important that all who wish to gain a deep insight into native affairs should understand it and give the phenomenon its true value. To give the question a practical application, it may safely be said that no Kikuyu native who becomes thahu during the course of his employment by a white master, will rest until he has been freed of his curse or ill luck, and he will probably desert with wages due to him in order to get rid of it; he cannot afford to wait, the risk is too great. ”

“ The compensation of a hundred sheep or goats can be paid either in goats or sheep or cattle, but, whatever is paid, the count is always kept in sheep or goats. For instance, a thenge, or big male goat, may count as two or three goats, according to size, and in the same way an ox has its stated rate of exchange and is counted as so many goats; in pre-European days the ox counted as three goats, and a heifer or cow counted as ten in paying compensation or in marriage fees for a wife. ”