The Ethnology of the British Colonies and DependenciesLatham, R. G. (Robert Gordon)
History
The Ethnology of the British Colonies and Dependencies
Latham, R. G. (Robert Gordon)
Ethnology
Everything connected with the administration of justice is rude and
savage; the severity of the punishment upon detection being the chief
preventive. The awards, of course, depend much upon the individual
character of the chiefs; and there are but few who have not exhibited
horrible proofs of cruelty. These, however, are no measures of the
temper of the people at large. The legitimate, normal, established, and
familiar forms of torture give us this. It may just be a shade or two
better than that of the autocrats--though bad at best. I still draw upon
the writer already quoted. "The most common mode of torture is what is
termed tying Guinea-fashion. In this the arms are closely drawn together
behind the back, by means of a cord tied tightly round them, about
midway between the elbows and shoulders. A piece of wood to act as a
rack, having been previously introduced, is then used so as to tighten
the cord, and so intense is the agony that one application is generally
sufficient to occasion the wretch so tortured to confess to anything
that is required of him. There are various other modes of torture in
common use among the natives of Guinea. One is tying the head, feet, and
hands, in such a way that by turning the body backwards, they may be
drawn together by the cords employed. Another is securing a wrist or
ankle to a block of wood by an iron staple. By means of a hammer any
degree of pressure may thus be applied, while the suffering so produced
is continuous, only being relieved by the wood being split, and the
staples removed, but this may not be done until a crime has been
confessed by a person who never committed it, and even then his limb has
generally been destroyed. It would not be interesting to here enumerate
the various tortures employed by a barbarous people, but when we
recollect the refinement of the art of torture in our own country in the
days of the maiden, the boot, and thumb-screws, we will cease to wonder
that substitutes for these should be used in a country where
civilization has not yet begun to elevate a people who are generally
allowed to be the lowest of the human race.
"There are some superstitious rites employed by Fetish-men for the
detection of crime; and whether it is that these people really possess
such powerful influence over their wretched dupes, as to frighten into
confession of his guilt the perpetrator of crime, or whether it is that
they manage by their numerous spies to obtain a clue sufficient in most
cases to lead to the detection of the person, is more than I can venture
to assert; but, be the means employed what they may, a Fetish-man will
assuredly very often bring a crime home to the right person, even after
the most patient investigation in the ordinary way has failed to elicit
the slightest clue.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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