Personally, I can imagine nothing more
terrible than the haunted existence of these poor kings whose pomp and
power must terminate in such a fashion.
I asked her whether the Motombo ever visited the god. She answered,
Yes, once in every five years. Then after many mystic ceremonies he
spent a week in the forest at a time of full moon. One of the Kalubis
had told her that on this occasion he had seen the Motombo and the god
sitting together under a tree, each with his arm round the other's
neck and apparently talking "like brothers." With the exception of
certain tales of its almost supernatural cunning, this was all that I
could learn about the god of the Pongos which I have sometimes been
tempted to believe was really a devil hid in the body of a huge and
ancient ape.
No, there was one more thing which I quote because it bears out
Babemba's story. It seems that captives from other tribes were
sometimes turned into the forest that the god might amuse itself by
killing them. This, indeed, was the fate to which we ourselves had
been doomed in accordance with the hateful Pongo custom.
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