quoted Aristaeus on Mars’ Hill.  But the African brain naturally confused it with a something gross and material:  thus Nzambi-a-Npungu is especially the lightning god.  Cariambemba is, properly, Kadi Mpemba or Ntangwa, the being that slays mankind:  Merolla describes it as an “abominable idol;” and the word is also applied to the owl, here as in Dahome the object of superstition.  I could trace no sign of worship paid to the sun (Tangwa or Muinyi), but there are multitudes of minor gods, probably deified ghosts, haunting particular places.  Thus, “Simbi” presides over villages and the “Tadi Nzazhi,” or Lightning Rock, near Boma; whilst the Yellala is the abode of an evil being which must be propitiated by offerings.  As usual amongst Fetish worshippers, the only trace of belief in a future state is faith in revenants—­returning men or ghosts.

Each village has an idol under a little wall-less roof, apparently an earthern pot of grease and feathers, called Mavunga.  This may be the Ovengwa of the “Camma people,” a “terrible catcher and eater of men, a vampire of the dead; personal, whilst the Ibamba are indistinct; tall as a tree; wandering through the woods, ever winking; whereas the Greek immortals were known by their motionless eyelids.  “Ngolo Wanga” is a man-shaped figure of unpainted wood, kept in the hut.  Every house is stuck inside and outside with idols and fetishes, interpreters of the Deity, each having its own jurisdiction over lightning, wind, and rain; some act as scarecrows; others teach magic, avert evils, preserve health and sight, protect cattle, and command fish in the sea or river.  They are in all manner of shapes, strings of mucuna and poison-beans; carved images stuck over with feathers and tassels; padlocks with a cowrie or a mirror set in them; horns full of mysterious “medicine;” iron-tipped poles; bones; birds’ beaks and talons; skins of snakes and leopards, and so forth.  We shall meet them again upon our travels.

No man walks abroad without his protecting charms, Nkisi or Nkizi, the Monda of the Gaboon, slung en baudrier, or hanging from his shoulder.  The portable fetish of our host is named “Baka chya Mazinga:  Professor Smith (p. 323) makes “Mazenga” to be “fetishes for the detection of theft.”  These magicae vanitates are prophylactics against every evil to which man’s frailty is heir.  The missioners were careful not to let their Congo converts have anything from their bodies, like hair or nail parings, for fear lest it be turned to superstitious use; and a beard (the price of conversion) was refused to the “King of Micocco.”  Like the idols, these talismans avert ill luck, bachelorhood, childlessness, poverty, and ill health; they are equally powerful against the machinations of foes, natural or supernatural; against wild beasts, the crocodile, the snake, and the leopard; and against wounds of lead and steel.  They can produce transformation; destroy enemies; cause rain or drought, fine or foul weather; raise and humble, enrich and impoverish countries; and, above all things, they are sovereign to make man brave in battle.  Shortly before we entered Banza Nkaye a propitiation of the tutelary gods took place:  Coxswain Deane had fired an Enfield, and the report throughout the settlement was that our guns would kill from the river-bank.