OCR Text |
Show 'OJJE"JNftFHICA Explorer Finds Lake of Dead and: a Strange People, P. A. "Talbot, Who Located Sacred Body of Water, Describes Weird Scene of Place Never Before Seen by White Men. Cape Town, Africa. Mr. and Mrs. P. Amaury Talbot have just returned to London from Central Africa, where they had spent two years in an anthropological, anthro-pological, botanical and zoological survey sur-vey from the Gulf of Guinea eastward across the continent. 'In a statement issued to the London press, Mr. Talbot declares that certain territory he and his wife traversed had never been visited vis-ited by a white man before. He said that in the Southern Nigerian bush he found evidence of the origin of the' witchcraft panic, which swept over England, New England and southeastern southeast-ern Europe in the middle of the 'seventeenth 'sev-enteenth century. Said Mr. Talbot: "The bush, with Its soft green twilight, twi-light, dark shadows, and quivering lights, is peopled by many terrors, but among these 'ojje,' or witchcraft, reigns supreme. Should the suspicion of witchcraft fall upon any one, only 'trial by ordeal can free them. The most usual one is that of eating esere, 'a poisonous bean which almost invariably in-variably kills the suspected person. The ordeals of boiling oil poured upon the palms of the hands and of peppercorns pepper-corns inserted in the eyes are far less dreaded, not only because their results re-sults are practically never fatal, but because the physical anguish entailed 5s acknowledged to be less intense than that caused by esere." One of the most interesting discoveries discov-eries was that of the Lake of the Dead in the Oban country. "The name of this lake," said Mr. Talbot, "occurs in many of the tribal songs, but for a long time I could not discover the meaning of the word, and all inquiries failed to elicit information, informa-tion, and when I believed I was in the neighborhood of this haunted spot and altered my course my carriers begged Ito be allowed not to proceed, and were left behind. After a struggle through flense bush we could see the edge of a sheet of water, along the banks of which were the holes of crocodiles, whose tracks covered the shore. The A , mm! P!H FWfM ' A -'luMJsllaWK Typical African Magician. scene was a weird one; the surface was absolutely still, and round about were ten-foot high bushes, with what were apparently great tufts of crearny flowers. These, however, proved to be nests of tree frogs. "The place is a sanctuary for all wild things, for. no .hunter would dare to penetrate the :bush to this dreaded spot. As we stood .at the edge gazing out over the water its quiet was sud-; denly broken by a broad ripple, and little fish were seen toispring agitatedly agitated-ly above the surface. A great python was crossing, and this, we learned, shared with the crocodiles the guardianship af ,the Sacred Lake." Describing a (Visit to a district where all the houses were built of ebony, Mr. Talbot said:' "The side of our tent almosc touched a little ebony hut built over a large and gruesome looking pot, the sides of which were prnamented with iron hooks. Before this, about breast high, and the length of a man, was a kind of altar, made of stout ebony blocks. In front of our tent door was a tall carved carv-ed pillar, ornamented with strings of human skulls. The people all had the filed teeth and thin, shrunken appearance appear-ance which are always associated with cannibal rites, and although they one and all stoutly denied knowledge of anything of the kind, every one ofVmr carriers said that not only was the pot in the little hut meant for the sacrifice sac-rifice of human victims, but the two hideous mud figures of a god and goddess god-dess in another shed on the further side of the carved pillar had had their heads worn away by the constant libations liba-tions of human blood poured over them." |