There were different ways of putting these unfortunate innocents to death. If they were born during the unlucky month, they were placed in the evening at the gateway of the village, to be trampled to death by the cattle as they were being driven into the village for the night. If the gods inspired the cattle to step over the infant, its life was generally, though not always, spared. The Malagasy are very fond of their children--the parents would kneel by the pathway, the father on the one side, the mother on the other, pleading, with strong crying and tears, that the gods would spare their little one. Sometimes the cattle, with more sense than the people, when they came up to the babe, would sniff at it and step over it, and thus its life might be spared. This was the case, it is said, with Rainilàiàrivòny, the late prime minister of Madagascar, who was born during the unlucky month. It was not so often that male children were exposed in this way, some excuse was usually found by the ‘diviners’; but as a rule the female children were thus exposed. Twins, whether male or female, were always put to death. A child was not always spared even when the cattle had stepped over it. The diviner would sometimes say: ‘A mistake has been made; this child is not to die in that way, but by the _Ahòhoka_.’ Water was poured into a large wooden platter, called a _sahàfa_. The child was taken, turned over, and its face held in the water until the poor innocent was suffocated. Some diviners were more exacting than others. Instead of effecting death by suffocation, they would cause a round hole to be dug in the ground, in which the child was placed, and covered with earth up to the waist; boiling water was then poured over it until death relieved the poor child of its torments, after which the pit was filled up with earth and pounded over. Thus thousands upon thousands of children fell victims to this superstition, and do so still in those parts of the island unreached by the benign influence of the Gospel of Christ. Members of my own congregation at Fìhàonana, Vònizòngo, had seen such atrocities as those I have just described committed, if they had not themselves actually taken part in them. The standard of morality was by no means high in heathen Madagascar. A man might be a drunkard, dishonest, a liar, or quarrelsome and given to fighting, and as such be regarded by his neighbours as a bad man, that is a bad member of society; but in other respects he might be utterly immoral without earning that title. A man’s morals were not regarded as having anything whatever to do with his personal character they were regarded as his own private affair. The community passed no judgement upon him.