Travels Of Richard And John Lander Into The Interior Of Africa For The Discovery Of The Course And Termination Of The Niger By Robert Huish
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In The Evening Of December The 29th, They Arrived At Demba Sego's
Hut, And The Next Morning Mr. Park Was Introduced By The Prince To
His Father, Tigitty Sego, Brother To The King Of Kasson, Chief Of
Tesee.
The old man viewed his visitor with great earnestness, having
never beheld but one white man before, whom Mr. Park discovered to be
Major Houghton.
He appeared to disbelieve what Mr. Park asserted, in
answer to his inquiries concerning the motives that induced him to
explore the country, and told him that he must go to Kooniakary to
pay his respects to the king, but desired to see him again before he
left Tesee.
Tesee is a large unwalled town, fortified only by a sort of citadel,
in which Tiggity Sego and his family reside. The present inhabitants,
though possessing abundance of cattle and corn, eat without scruple
rats, moles, squirrels, snakes, locusts, &c. The attendants of Mr.
Park were one evening invited to a feast, where making a hearty meal
of what they thought to be fish and kouskous, one of them found a
piece of hard skin in the dish, which he brought away with him, to
show Mr. Park what sort of fish they had been eating. On examining
the skin, it was discovered they had been feasting on a large snake.
Another custom, which is rigidly adhered to, is, that no woman is
allowed to eat an egg, and nothing will more affront a woman of Tesee
than to offer her an egg. The men, however, eat eggs without scruple.
The following anecdote will show, that in some particulars the
African and European women have a great resemblance to each other,
and that conjugal infidelity is by no means confined to the latter. A
young man, a kafir of considerable affluence, who had recently
married a young and handsome wife, applied to a very devout Bushreen
or Mussulman priest of his acquaintance, to procure him saphies for
his protection during the approaching war. The Bushreen complied with
his request, and to render the saphies more efficacious, enjoined the
young man to avoid any nuptial intercourse with his bride for the
space of six weeks. The kafir obeyed, and without telling his wife
the real cause, absented himself from her company. In the mean time
it was whispered that the Bushreen, who always performed his evening
devotions at the door of the kafir's hut, was more intimate with the
young wife, than was consistent with virtue, or the sanctity of his
profession. The husband was unwilling to suspect the honour of his
sanctified friend, whose outward show of religion, as is the case
with the priests and parsons of the civilized part of the world,
protected him from even the suspicion of so flagitious an act. Some
time, however, elapsed before any jealousy arose in the mind of the
husband, but hearing the charge repeated, he interrogated his wife on
the subject, who confessed that the holy man had seduced her.
Hereupon the kafir put her into confinement, and called a palaver on
the Bushreen's conduct, which Mr. Park was invited to attend.
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