In the Obogwe Mbari house--the only one which we have yet found built in two separate edifices--the first building was dedicated to Amad’ongha and the second to Ale, locally called Ala. Our informant, Omere Madu, was the son of the late head chief who therefore, _ipso facto_, was priest of Ale. He told us that this goddess was the dominant power in the town, and that she ordered her priest to have the two houses built in that place and form--one for herself and one for her spouse Amad’ongha. In both buildings he sits in the seat of honour, but in the first alone, while in the second she is seen on his left, in the same position as that of the figure at Obodo to which her name was first given, but which was later called Omu Ngwaw, the fruitful mother (see p. 40). [Illustration: FIG. 13. Group in Obogwe Mbari house] In the temple dedicated to the Thunderer, on the left of the central figure is seen one, the name of which was said to be Eku Nechi--_i.e._ ‘the big woman who cooks,’ or more fully ‘who gathers the children of others around her and cooks for them.’ The figure is seated, supporting a boy and a girl against her sides; while another pair sits, one upon each of her outstretched legs. The most singular thing about this group is that each of the male children bears a crescent moon for face, while from the necks of the two girls is painted a cloth thickly covered with white dots. On the wall of the Ale shrine, a fresco may be seen on which a moon-faced boy is depicted climbing up the right hand side of a rainbow, painted in black, yellow and red stripes. In such a position he is supposed to be an envoy from the Earth Goddess, climbing the sky with a message from Amade Onhia, or, when descending, bringing word from the latter to the children of men. Beneath, on a black ground, a crescent moon and stars are shown--the stars represented by white dots exactly like those painted round the necks of the girl piccans of Eku Nechi. It is not impossible therefore that here again, in ‘the big woman who feeds the children of others,’ we have another forgotten picturing of Ale, the Earth Mother, with her starry progeny. A singular fact about all the Mbari shrines hitherto visited is that, in each, figures may be seen, obviously modelled with the express intention of depicting licence in its most blatant form. Primitive peoples the world over, however frank in picturing or mentioning facts treated with the greatest reticence by civilised races, are usually ignorant of real vulgarity or indecency, since the very simplicity of manner and treatment robs their statements of offence. The Ibo of this region, especially, have a code with regard to sexual matters which, however lax according to our ideas, is yet strangely strict in some directions. According to them four of the most evil things are: