Images de page
PDF
ePub

one, and fo the wonder with them ceafed. But it was not fo with the king it made the most favourable and lafting impreffion upon his mindl; nor did I ever after fee, in his countenance, any marks either of doubt or diffidence, but always, on the contrary, the most decifive proofs of friendship, confidence, and attention, and the moft implicit belief of every thing I advanced upon any fubject from my own knowledge.

The experiment was twice afterwards in prefence of Ras Michael. But he would not rifk his good fhields, and always produced the table, faying, "Engedan and thofe foolish boys were rightly ferved; they thought Yagoube was a liar like themfelves, and they loft their fhields; but I believed him, and gave him my table for curiosity only, and fo I faved mine."

[ocr errors]

Singular Cuftoms in Abyffinia *.

IT is here I propofe to take notice of that people eating, what they call

of an unnatural cuftom which prevails univerfally in Abyffinia, and which in early ages feems to have been common to the whole world. I did not think that any perfon of moderate knowledge in profane learning could have been ignorant of this remarkable cuftom among the nations of the caft. But what still more furprifed me, and is the leaft pardonable part of the whole, was the ignorance of part of the law of God, the earlift that was given to man, the moft frequently noted, infifted upon, and prohibited. I have faid, in the course of the narrative of my journey from Mafuah, that, a small distance from Axum, I overtook on the way three travellers, who feemed to be foldiers, driving a cow before them. They halted at a brook, threw down the beaft, and one of 'them cut a pretty large collop of flesh from its buttocks, after which they drove the cow gently on as before. A violent outery was raised in England at hearing this circumftance, which they did not hefitate to pronounce impoffible, when the manners and cuftoms of Abynia were to them utterly unknown The Jefuits, eftablished in Abyffinia for a bove a hundred years, had told them

raw meat, in every page, and yet they were ignorant of this. Poncet, too, had done the fame, but Poncet they had not read; and if any writer upon Ethiopia had omitted to mention it, it was because it was one of thofe facts too notorious to be repeated to fwell a volume.

It must be from prejudice alone we condemn the eating of raw flesh; no precept, divine, or human, that Í know, forbids it; and if it is true, as later travellers have difcovered, that there are nations ignorant of the use of fire, any law against eating raw flesh could never have been intended by God as obligatory upon mankind in general. At any rate, it is certainly not clearly known, whether the eating raw flesh was not an earlier and more general practice than by preparing it with fire; I think it was.

Many wife and learned men have doubted whether it was at firft permitted to man to eat animal food at all, I do not pretend to give any opinion upon the fubject, but many topics have been maintained fuccefsfully upon much more flender grounds. God, the author of life, and the best judge of what was proper to maintain it, gave this regimen to our firk From the fame,

parents

[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]

ry

-"Behold, I have given you every "herb bearing feed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and evetree, in the which is the fruit of "a tree yielding feed: to you it fhall "be for meat." And though, immediately after, he mentions both beafts and fowls, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth, he does not fay that he has defigned any of thefe On the contrary, as meat for man.

he feems to have intended the vege-
table creation as food for both man
and beaft And to every beaft of
"the earth and to every fowl of the
"air, and to every thing that creep-
"eth upon the earth, wherein there
"is life, I have given every green
"herb for meat; and it was fo." Af-
ter the flood, when mankind began
to repoffefs the earth, God gave Noah
a much more extenfive permiffion-
"Every moving thing that liveth
"fhall be meat for you; even as the
green herb have I given you al
"things."

[ocr errors]

As the criterion of judging of their aptitude for food was declared to be their moving and having life, a dan ger appeared of misinterpretation, and that thefe creatures fhould be ufed living; a thing which God by no means intended, and therefore, immediately after, it is laid, " But flefh "with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof, fhall you not eat ;

but that

whole law; which not only fhews
that this abute was common,
it was deeply rooted in, and interwo
ven with, the manners of the Heb
rews. He pofitively prohibits it four
times in one chapter in Deuterono-
my, and thrice in one of the chapters
of Leviticus-"Thou shalt not eat
"the blood, for the blood is the life;
"thou shalt pour it upon the earth
"like water."

Although the many inftances of
God's tendernefs to the brute crea
tion, that conftantly occur in the Mo-
faical precepts, and are a very beauti-
ful part of them, and though the bar
barity of the cuftom itfel: might rea
fonably lead us to think that huma
nity alone was a fufficient motive for
the prohibition of eating animals a
live, yet nothing can be more certain
than that greater confequences were
annexed to the indu ging in this crime
One of
than what was apprehended from a
mere depravity of manners.
the molt learned and fenfible men that
ever wrote upon the facred fcriptures
obferves, that God, in forbidding this
practice, ufes more fevere cerunca
tion, and more threatening language,
than against any other fin, excepting
idolatry, with which it is conftantly
joined. God declares, "I will fet

[graphic]
[ocr errors]

my face againft him that eateth "blood, in the fame manner as I will against him that facrificeth his fon

gainft him that eateth flesh wh blood, till I cut him off from the people."

or, as it is rendered by the belt inter-to Moloch; I will fet my face apreters, Flefh, or members, torn from living animals having the blood in them, thou fhalt not eat. We fee then, by this prohibition, that this abufe of eating living meat, or part of animals while yet alive, was known in the days of Noah, and forbidden after being fo known, and it is precifely what is practifed in Abyllinia to this day. This law, then, was prior to that of Mofes, but it came from the fame legislator. It was given to Noah, and confequently obligatory upon the whole world. Mofes, however, infifts upon it throughout his VOL. XII. No. 67.

We have an inftance in the life of Saul that fhews the propenfity of the Ifraelites to this crime. Saul's army, after a battle, flew, that is, fell vora cioufly upon the cattle they had ta ken, and threw them upon the ground to cut off their flefh, and eat them raw, fo that the army was defiled by eating blood, or living animal. To prevent this, Saul caufed roll to him a great ftone, and ordered thofe that killed their oxen to cut their throats

прод

upon that ftone. This was the only lawful way of killing animals for food; the tying of the ox and throwing it upon the ground was not permitted as equivalent. The Ifraelites did probably in that cafe as do the Abyffinians at this day; they cut a part of its throat, fo that blood may be feen upon the ground, but nothing mortal to the animal followed from that wound. But, after laying his head upon a large ftone, and cutting his throat, the blood fell from on high, or was poured on the ground like water, and fufficient evidence appeared the creature was dead before it was attempted to eat it. We have seen that the Abyffinians came from Paleftine a very few years after this; and we are not to doubt that they then carried with them this, with many other Jewish cultoms, which they have continued to this day.

The author I laft quoted fays, that it is plain, from all the books of the eaftern nations, that their motive for eating flesh with the life, or limbs of living animals cut off with the blood, was from motives of religion, and for the purposes of idolatry, and fo it probably had been among the Jews; for one of the reafons given in Leviticus for the prohibition of eating blood, or living flesh, is, that the people may no longer offer facrifices to devils, after whom they have gone a-whoring. If the reader chooses to be further informed how very common this practice was, he need only read the Halacoth Gedaloth, or its tranflation, where the whole chapter is taken up with inftances of this kind.

That this practice likewife prevailed in Europe, as well as in Afia and Africa, may be collected from various authors. The Greeks had their bloody feafts and facrifices where they ate living flesh; thefe were called Omophagia. Arnobius fays, "Let us pafs over the horrid fcenes prefented at the Bacchanalian feaft, wherein, with a counterfeited fury,

though with a truly depraved heart, you twine a number of ferpents around you, and, pretending to be pof feffed with fome god, or fpirit, you tear to pieces with bloody mouths the bowels of living goats, which cry all the time from the torture they fuffer.” From all this it appears, that the prac tice of the Abyffinians eating live a nimals at this day, was very far from being new, or, what was nonfenfically faid, impoffible. And I fhail only further obferve, that thofe of my readers that wifh to indulge a fpirit of criticifm upon the great variety of customs, men, and manners, related in this hiftory, or have those criticisms attended to, fhould furnish themselves with a more decent ftock of reading than, in this inftance, they feem to have poffeffed; or, when another example occurs of that kind, which they call impoffible, that they would take the truth of it upon my word, and believe what they are not fufficiently qualified to inveftigate.

Confiftent with the plan of this work, which is to defcribe the manners of the feveral nations through which I paffed, good and bad, as I obferved them, I cannot avoid giving fome account of this Polyphemus banquet, as far as decency will permit me ; it is part of the hiftory of a barbarous people; whatever I might wifi, I cannot decline it.

In the capital, where one is fafe from furprife at all times, or in the country or villages, when the rains have become fo conftant that the valleys will not bear a horse to pass them, or that men cannot venture far from home through fear of being furrounded and fwept away by temporary torrents, occafioned by fudden fhowers on the mountains; in a word, when a man can fay he is fafe at home, and the fpear and fhield is hung up in the hall, a number of people of the best fashion in the villages, of both fexes, courtiers in the palace, or citizens in the town, meet toge

ther

ther to dine between twelve and one clock.

A long table is fet in the middle of a large room, and benches befide it for a number of guefts who are in vited. Tables and benches the Portugueze introduced amongst them; but bull hides, fpread upon the ground, ferved them before, as they do in the camp and country now. A cow or bull, one or more, as the company is numerous, is brought clofe to the door, and his feet ftrongly tied. The kin that hangs down under his chin and throat, which I think we call the dew-lap in England, is cut only fo deep as to arrive at the fat, of which it totally confifts, and, by the feparation of a few small blood-veffels, fix or feven drops of blood only fall upon the ground. They have no ftone, bench, nor altar upon which thefe cruel affaffins lay the animal's head in this operation. I fhould beg his pardon indeed for calling him an affaffin, as he is not fo merciful as to aim at the life, but, on the contrary, to keep the beaft alive till he be totally eat up. Having fatisfied the Mofaical law, according to his conception, by pouring thefe fix or feven drops upon the ground, two or more of them fall to work; on the back of the beaft, and on each fide of the fpine they cut kin-deep; then putting their fingers between the flesh and the fkin, they begin to ftrip the hide of the animal half way down his ribs, and fo on to the buttock, cutting the skin where ver it hinders them commodiously to ftrip the poor animal bare. All the fiefh on the buttocks is cut off then, and in folid, fquare pieces, without bones, or much effufion of blood; and the prodigious noife the animal makes is a fignal for the company to ft down to table.

There are then laid before every greft, instead of plates, round cakes, I may fo call them, about twice as big as a pan-cake, and fomething Thicker and tougher. It is unleaven

ed bread of a fourish taste, far from being difagreeable, and very eafily di gefted, made of a grain called teff. It is of different colours, from black to the colour of the whiteft wheat-bread, Three or four of thefe cakes are generally put uppermoft, for the food of the perfon oppofite to whofe feat they are placed. Beneath thefe are four or five of ordinary bread, and of a blackish kind. Thefe ferve the maf ter to wipe his fingers upon; and af terwards the fervant, for bread to his dinner,

Two or three fervants then come, each with a fquare piece of beef in their bare hands, laying it upon the cakes of teff, placed like difhes down the table, without cloth or any thing elfe beneath them. By this time all the guests have knives in their hands, and their men have large crooked ones, which they put to all forts of ufes during the time of the war. The women have fmall clafped knives, fuch as the worft of the kind made at Birmingham, fold for a penny each.

The company are fo ranged that one man fits between two women; the man with his long knife cuts a thin piece, which would be thought a good beef ftake in England, while you fee the motion of the fibres yet perfectly diftinct, and alive in the flesh, No man in Abyffinia, of any fashion whatever, feeds himself, or touches his own meat. The women take the ftake and cut it length-ways like ftrings, about the thicknefs of your little finger, then crossways into fquare pieces, fomething fmaller than dice. This they lay upon a piece of the teff bread, ftrongly powdered with black pepper, or Cayenne pepper, and foffil-falt, they them wrap it up in the teff bread like a cartridge.

In the mean time, the man having put up his knife, with each hand refting upon his neighbour's knee, his body ftooping, his head low and forward, and mouth open very like E 2

an

[ocr errors]

an idiot, turns to the one whofe car trige is first ready, who ftuffs the whole of it into his mouth, which is fo full that he is in conftant danger of being choked. This is a mark of grandeur. Thegreater the man would feem to be, the larger piece he takes in his mouth; and the more nuife he makes in chewing it, the more polite he is thought to be. They, have indeed, a proverb that fays, Beg. gars and thieves only eat fmall pieces, or without making a noife" Having dispatched this morfel, which he does very expedit oufly, his next femal neighbour holds forth ano ther cartridge, which goes the fame way, and fo on till he is fansfied. He never drinks till he has finished eating; and, before he b gins, in gratitude to the fair ones that fed him, he makes up two fmall rolls of the fame kind and form; each of his neighbours open their mouths at the fame time, while with cach band he puts their portion into their mouths. He then fails to drink ng out of a large handfome horn; the Ja es eat till they are fat sfied, and then a drink together, "Vive la Joye et la Jeuneffe!" A great deal of mirth and joke goes round, very feldom with any mixture of acrimony or ill humour.

All this time, the unfortunate victim at the door is bleeding indeed, bu bleeding little. As long as they can cut off the flesh from his bones, they do not meddie with the thighs, or the parts where the great arteries At lift they fall upon the thighs likewife; and foon after the animal, bleeding to death, becomes fo tough that the canibal, who have the rt of it to t, find very hard work to feparate the flesh from the

are.

bones with their teeth like dogs.

In the mean time, thofe withia are very much elevated; love lights all its fires, and every thing is permitted with abfolute freedom. There is no coynef, no d lays, no need of appointments or retirement to gratify their wishes; there are no rooms but one, in which they facrifice both to Bacchus and to Venus. The two men nearest the vacuum a pair have made on the bench by leaving their feats, hold up their upper garment like a fkreen before the two that have left the bench; and, if we may judge by found, they feem to think it as great a fhame to make love in filence as to eat. Replaced in their feats again, the company drink the happy couple's health; and their example is followed at different ends of the table, as each couple is difpofed. All this paffes without remark or fcandal, not a heentious word is uttered, no the most distant joke upon the tranfaction.

Thefe lad es are, for the moft part, women of family and character, and they and the r gallants are reciprocally d ftinguiled by the name Woodage, which anfwers to what in Italy they call Cicifbey; and, iad ed, I bieve that the name itself, as well as the practice, is Hebrew; fchus chis bežim, fignifies attendants or com panions of the bride, or bride's man, as we call it in England. The only difference is, that in Europe the inti macy and attendance continues during the marriage, while, among the Jews, it was permitted only the few days of the marriage ceremony. The a verfion to Judaifm, in the ladies of Europe, has probably led them to the prolongation of the term.

[ocr errors][merged small]
« PrécédentContinuer »