Tag: Mende

An evil spirit lived in a hole in the ground, as evil spirits do, and he had a wife and seven children. When hungry season came and there was nothing left to eat, the seven children cried:

“Father, find us something to eat, or we will die!”

The wicked spirit went out to see what he could find, and when walking along a road he overtook a man who carried a kinjah of rice on his back.

“Stranger,” he said politely, “since we travel the same way I will help you. Place your burden on my back, and rest awhile.”

The man willingly agreed to this, but as soon as he had the kinjah strapped securely on his back the spirit started running. He ran so fast the man could not keep up, and escaped into the forest with the load of rice. He was feeling proud and happy as he drew near to his home, for evil spirits love stealing even better than they love eating, and he made pleasant noises for his family to hear.

Also he sang a song:

“Put on the pot and make it hot to cook what I am bringing. I bring a prize, a fine surprise, Which makes a song for singing.”

The rice was cooked and the happy family ate till their stomachs swelled. In the days which followed the spirit went out regularly to find men who carried burdens of food, and he always managed to steal something and bring it home. He was too lazy to grow his own food, and too dishonest to buy any.

For several months he continued stealing, and finally things came to such a pass that men in a nearby town asked their Head Mawni to help them rid the land of this cunning thief.

The Mawni Society is the most secret and important of all Loma tribal societies, and the Head Mawni in every town possesses at least one Wuuni. A Wuuni is an unseen something which has no respect for evil spirits and will catch and devour one whenever it can; and it talks Loma through its Head. Mawni calls upon it only in cases of great need.

The Head Mawni of this town talked to his Wuuni and put it in a kinjah which appeared to be full of rice. The Mawni put the kinjah on his own back, and singing lustily to attract the spirit’s attention he walked through the forest.

Soon the spirit appeared, stole the kinjah and ran away. As he drew near his home he made pleasant noises for his family to hear, and sang a song:

“A bag of rice is rather nice and better if it’s stolen; Let’s fill the pot and eat the lot until we’re fully swollen”

The Wuuni laughed quietly to himself, and a shiver trickled down the spirit’s spine. The Wuuni softly sang:

“An Evil Thing should never sing while bearing bags untied; They might have nice instead of rice, Or something worse, inside.”

The spirit heard someone singing and hurried quickly to his hole. His family gathered around while he untied the kinjah – and out jumped the Wuuni!

The spirits cried out in alarm, and huddled in one corner of the hole.
“Give me food, snarled the Wuuni. The spirit trembled, and pushed his wife across. The Wuuni tore her to pieces and cracked her bones.

“More!” he demanded. The helpless spirit pushed his children across one by one, although they cried out bitterly against his treatment, and when all seven had been swallowed the father spirit tried to make himself as small as possible.

“O Evil Thing,” the Wuuni sang, You’ve stolen, lied, and cheated. All those who do such things as you, must be severely treated.”

But he did not eat the spirit at once, for the Head Mawni had requested him to bring the thief back to the town that night. The spirit, of course, was the undead part of a man who had died in the town some years before; and the family to which he had belonged, and the Head Mawni, wanted to find out why he had been doing such wicked things instead of helping with the crops.

As is the custom in such cases a two-roomed house was chosen as the place of the trail; the descendants of the spirit gathered in one room, and the Head Mawni, the Wuuni, and the evil spirit entered the other one, which was quite empty except for a few dry sticks.

The Head Mawni asked the spirit why he had been so wicked since he left his mortal body.

“My family was unkind to me,” the spirit complained. I told them my spirit would trouble them when I died, but they only laughed. They made me suffer. When I died they neglected my grave. Why should I love such people?”

His family and descendants in the next room hotly denied this, and gave examples of their kindness to him. The Wuuni could be heard crying, “Let me kill him” in a nasal voice. The spirit argued bitterly with the people in the next-door room, but finally judgment was given against him, and it was decided that he must die.

“Can I kill him?” the Wuuni asked excitedly.

“You can kill him,” the Head Mawni agreed. The spirit shrilled in panic. The people in the next-door room heard the Wuuni cracking his bones as if they were dry sticks of wood, and then heard the sounds of eating.

When they went in later the Wuuni had already gone away, and not even a crumb lay on the floor to mark the passing of the evil spirit. There was only the Head Mawni and a few broken sticks. The spirit no longer existed even as a spirit, and would never return to trouble the town again.

Thus an evil spirit suffered a terrible death and justice was done, as it always is done with liars, thieves, and cheats.

In a certain town there lived a woman who was unfaithful to her husband; and although her husband beat her, the woman still continued taking lovers. The husband went to as Wise Man and said:

“Help me stop my wife from taking lovers.”

“What will you give me if I do this?”

“I will give you three hampers of rice.”

The Wise Man agreed. He burned Teri, which is a kind of medicine made of palm oil, charcoal, salt and various magic things, and made two medicines; and was sweet, the other poisonous. and he told the husband what to do.

That night the husband rubbed sweet medicine on his belly.

“What are you doing?” asked his wife.

“I am using medicine to make me strong.” Then he lay down with his wife. In he morning he hid the sweet medicine and handed her the poison, saying:

“I am going on a journey. I shall not be back tonight. Keep my medicine in a secret place, and don’t let anyone use it.”

He went away. That night the faithless woman brought her lover to the house; and wishing that he should be strong she gave him medicine to rub upon his belly. But this was the poisonous medicine; and her lover quickly died. She began to wail and weep, not knowing what to do.

How, the Wise Man had hidden himself outside the house, knowing this would happen; and now he came and said to her:

“I see your lover died. What will you give me if I take the body from your home?”

“I will give you three hampers of corn,” the woman said.

“And will you swear on your mother’s grave to be a faithful wife?”

“I will swear on my mother’s grave.”

The Wise Man agreed to remove the body. In this town there was a thief accustomed to stealing kinjahs of rice at night. The Wise man placed the body in a kinjah and left it by the open door.

The thief, who prowled about at night, saw the kinjah and stole it. He took it to his home and gave it to his wife. She opened it, and found a body in it.

“Eeee! she cried in fright. “Fool, fool! How is this? I see the dead body of the chief’s first son! We will die for this. Aieee!”

She began softly wailing, and the thief sat down and wept. Just then the Wise Man walked in through the door.

“I see someone has killed the Chief’s first son,” he said. What will you give me if I take his body from your house?”

“I will give you three hampers of cassava,” said the thief.

“And will you swear on your mother’s grave to be an honest man?”

The thief agreed to do this. The wise man tied the body in the hamper and carried it outside. He went quietly to a tree in front of the old Chief’s house, and taking the body from the hamper he propped it against the tree. The Chief was a cruel and ill-tempered man, and had made a law that no one in his town was to sing. so now the Wise man hid behind the tree and he began to sing. It was a song of thieves and faithless wives whose bodies were cut up with knives.

The Chief heard the song and rose from his bed in rage, although it was quite a good song, and made the Thief and the adulteress tremble in their houses. He seized his bow and from his door he shot an arrow at the figure by the tree. The arrow pierced his dead son’s heart.

The Wise Man slipped away. The Chief discovered he had shot his favorite son, and on the Wise Man’s good advice he swore on his mother’s grave that he would henceforth let his people sing as and when they wished.

Thus it was that a Wise Man brought death to an adulterer, restored faith in a faithless wife, persuaded a thief to be honest, caused a cruel Chief to repent and filled a songless village with songs of villagers.

Men tell a half-forgotten tale of a secret town called Kpademai. This town was founded by an accomplished warrior called Kpade, and thus its name means “Followers of Kpade.” It lay beside a sweet stream and belonged to the Bondo Loma Clan; they were careful not to let any stranger see it, lest it be attacked.

When anyone in Kpademai died his spirit was seen slowly climbing a nearby hill called Worler Gizi, dressed in his burial shroud; and the path which ascended the hill was kept in good repair by the spirits who lived there.

These ancestral spirits were regarded with pious veneration by the townsfolk and in return the spirits guarded the town and caused the fields to yield abundant crops.

One day a hunter from a hostile clan chanced to discover the secret town when hunting in the forest for black deer, and he reported to the council of his clan, saying the town was rich and the nearby lands were fair and fertile.

The enemy clan resembled an army under the leadership of a great warrior named Tegrili and the army marched on Kpademai.

On the first day of the battle Tegrili was captured and put to death, but the fight wore on for several days until the spirit Worler Gizi seized and bound the hostile warriors, and killed them in such a dreadful way that the sweet-water stream turned to blood.

Thereafter Kpademai was left in peace and prospers still.

Pardoo Orphan lived in a fine village, but he was the poorest of men. He had no land, no house, no clothes, not even a cooking pot; and he had no family no one cared for him. He begged for food and was driven form the village.

He went to live in the forest, and his health became so poor that blindness closed his eyes and he barely lived by groping on the ground for rotten fruit and nuts. When he was nearly dead he heard a voice which said:

“Pardoo, if I help you, will you promise to help me?”

“Oh yes,” cried Pardoo, not knowing if the voice belonged to man or spirit. He would have promised anything to anyone – for what had he to lose?

“Then lift your face towards the sky.”

Pardoo turned his face towards the sky, and some drops of burning liquid fell on his sightless eyes. Then his eyes were opened: the precious gift of sight had been restored to him, and his heart was filled with joy.

“Close your eyes, Pardoo,” said the voice. Pardoo closed his eyes. “Now open them.”

He saw a bright new town before him where only trees had been.
“This town is yours,” the voice said.

“Thank you. But there are no people.”

He was commanded to close his eyes again, and when he open them the town was stocked with animals and people.

“You have one hundred wives,” the voice went on, “five hundred slaves and a thousand warriors; and such gold as few men ever see. Go, dwell in your town and be chief.”

Pardoo was suddenly clean and clothed in chiefly garments; and he went into his town. Here he lived as Chief in a fine big house; he lived with every comfort and happiness for three full years, and fathered twenty girls and one man-child. He loved his son above all other things.

One day as he was walking beneath a giant cotton tree nearby his house, Chief Pardoo heard a voice above him call:

“Oh Pardoo! Chief Pardoo!”

He looked up, and saw a large white bird upon a branch.

“Pardoo,” said to the bird, “I helped you once. Will you now help me?”

Pardoo agree at once. He would have promised anything to this fabulous bird.

“Here is my nest,” the bird went on, “I have an egg. A single egg. I have no other egg, and treasure this one as you treasure you only son. But now I must leave on a long journey to another place, and wish you to take care of my egg.”

Pardoo promised he would guard the egg as he guarded his only son.

“If the egg should break, fall prey to a snake, be boiled or spoiled or stolen,” said the bird, “a strange and helpless thing will happen to you. Remember this, Pardoo.”

Pardoo set guards about the tree, and the white bird flew away. The bird was away for several seasons; and one day Pardoo’s son saw the egg in the cotton tree. He ran to his father and said he wanted an egg to eat.

His father brought him a hen’s egg.

“Not a hen’s egg, Father,” said the boy.

Pardoo brought a pigeon’s egg.

“Not a pigeon’s egg, Father.”

Pardoo brought eagles’ eggs, hawks’ eggs, palm birds’ eggs and crows’ eggs, but none of them would do.

“Then what kind of an egg do you want?” he cried.

“I want the egg in the cottonwood tree, Father.”

Pardoo turned pale. He dare not touch that egg. “It would give you stomach pains. It is a special egg I have promised to keep safe.”

The lad began to cry. He would not eat and he refused to speak to his father except to say: “If you love that egg better than you love me then just tell me so, and I’ll go and live in a tree myself, somewhere in the forest. Then everyone will be sorry!”

Finally Pardoo weakened, and reluctantly agreed to break his promise. He had the egg brought to him, boiled it, and gave it to his son. His son, who had been spoiled by royal favor, just laughed and threw the egg down on the ground.

The white bird had left a little fly to watch the egg, and now the fly flew away and reported that the egg had been stolen, boiled, and broken. The great bird flew on flapping wings north to the cottonwood tree, and there it came to rest upon a branch. It stood there for a long time gazing at its empty nest, and down at Pardoo’s house, and wept.

Then it called Pardoo and said:

“O weak and foolish Pardoo, you have broken your word and killed my egg. You are weak, Pardoo, you cannot keep a promise; and he who makes and breaks a promise has not the right or might to be a chief!”

Pardoo was suddenly blind again, a beggar in evil-smelling rags; and his tongue was twisted so he could not speak. His own son threw stones at him, his people drove him from the town, and he wandered in the forests till he died.

Never make a promise unless it can be kept; then keep it well.