The Nganga superintends, as grand inquisitor, the witch-ordeal, by causing the accused to chew red-wood and other drugs in this land ferax venenorum. Park was right: "By witchcraft is meant pretended magic, affecting the lives and healths of persons, in other words it is the administering of poison." European "Narratives of Sorcery and Magic" exactly explain the African idea, except in one point: there the witch "only suffered from not being able to prove to Satan how much she burned to suffer for his sake;" here she has no Satan. Both European and African are the firmest believers in their own powers; they often confess, although knowing that the confession leads directly to torture and death, with all the diabolical ingenuity of which either race was capable. In Tuckey's time a bargain was concluded by breaking a leaf or a blade of grass, and this rite it was "found necessary to perform with the seller of every fowl:" apparently it is now obsolete. Finally, although the Fetish man may be wrong, the fetish cannot err. If a contretemps occur, a reason will surely be found; and, should the "doctor" die, he has fallen a victim to a rival or an enemy more powerful than himself. A striking institution of the Congo region is that of the Jinkemba, which, curious to say, is unnoticed by Tuckey. It is not, however, peculiar to the Congo; it is the "Semo" of the Susus or Soosoos of the Windward Coast, and the "Purrah" of the Sherbro-Balloms or Bulloms, rendered Anglicè by "free-masonry." The novitiate there lasts for seven or eight years, and whilst the boys live in the woods food is placed for them by their relations: the initiation, indeed, appears to be especially severe. Here all the free-born males are subjected to the wrongly called "Mosaic rite." Merolla tells us that the wizards circumcise children on the eighth day (like the Jews), not out of regard for the law, but with some wicked end and purpose of their own. At any time between the ages of five and fifteen (eight to ten being generally preferred), boys are taken from their parents (which must be an exceeding comfort to the latter), and for a native year, which is half of ours, they must dwell in the Vivála ya Ankimba, or Casa de Feitiço, like that which we passed before reaching Banza Nokki. They are now instructed by the Nganga in the practices of their intricate creed; they are taught the mysteries under solemn oaths, and, in fine, they are prepared for marriage. Upon the Congo they must eat no cooked food, living wholly upon roots and edibles; but they are allowed to enter the villages for provisions, and here they often appear armed with matchets, bayonets, and wooden swords. Their faces and necks, bodies and arms, are ghastly white with chalk or ashes; the hair is left in its original jet, and the dingy lower limbs contrast violently with the ghostlike absence of colour above. The dress is a crinoline of palm-fronds, some fresh and green, others sere