Twilight Tales of the Black Uganda BY MRS. A. B. FISHER {Ruth Hurditch) AUTHOR OF ON THE BORDERS OF PIGMY LAKE WITH ILLUSTRATIONS MARSHALL BROTHERS, LTD, PUBLISHERS LONDON, EDINBURGH 6- NEW YORK H. W. SIMPSON AND CO.. 1 ID., PRINTERS, RICHMOND, LONKON. INTRODUCTION IN recent years so many books have been published on the country of Uganda, that it indeed requires courage, and almost demands an apology from one, attempting to add to that list. The excuse now offered to the reader, is, that this is not a record of travel or personal impressions entirely, but is the result of an insistent endeavour to make the country beyond Uganda yield up its own secrets, and to reveal the story of its peoples and their beliefs, before the white man trespassed on their domains. During many years spent in Toro and Bunyoro, I prevailed on the respective kings, Daudi Kasagama and Andereya Duhaga, to undertake to write the history of their country. This was no light task for them, as they had no very clear idea of the subject themselves, and were only just learning to wield the pen. However, they readily took up with the suggestion, and called in from distant villages, and from the solitude of the mountains, some of the old witch-doctors, who perforce had been obliged to forsake their old means of livelihood, or prac- tice it in those regions where the onflowing tide of Christianity had not yet reached. As Toro and Bunyoro were one kingdom, and its people one race until recent years, their history is synonymous. Thus comparing these two independent accounts, it has been possible to arrive at a fairly accurate story of their ancient habits and beliefs. The chapters dealing with these records of the two rulers (vi.-xiii.) are merely a translation from their own writings ; and I have tried as far as possible to translate the text literally. Heaps of non-essential details have had to be cleared away, and in many cases modifications been made, or passages entirely discarded, to purify the story and render it suitable reading to the general public. The work was a novel and laborious task to these two dusky potentates, who, day after day, sat in their crude studies, writing as rapidly as they could, while the quaint, withered up, skin-clad ancients squatted on the floor, and related the legends that had been handed down by the generations of sages before them. Writing is quite a newly-acquired art introduced by the missionaries ; no traces of caligraphy or inscriptions being found among these peoples, unless is excepted the carving of stars, lines and spots on the ivory war-horns of the more inland savage tribes, signifying the clan to which the horn belonged. It is, therefore, all the more remarkable that this race should be found in the heart of Africa, surrounded by fierce and migratory tribes, posses- sing and preserving, in spite of abject ignorance, a record of consecutive rulers who were preceded by supposed demi-gods and gods — a history remarkably analagous in form to that of the ancient Egyptians. The people generally are strangely ignorant of their past, and evince very little curiosity with regard to it. Careless about everything, they have been perfectly willing to leave it, and all questions dealing with the spirit-world, in the hands of their witch-doctors, whom they implicitly believed and obeyed whenever trouble or sickness visited them. To-day the whole condition of Central Africa is being metamorphosed. The country has been parcelled out among the European Powers, and in their wake, civilisa- tion is rapidly driving out barbarism and ignorance, while Christianity is infusing new life into the people, and inspiring them with noble and forceful ideas. Fetishism is quickly dying out, and thus one by one the links with the past, are being severed and forgotten. Within the last ten years Toro and Bunyoro have practically swept away all outward belief in their old creeds, by gathering out from the homes of the people the charms and fetishes which were their oracle, and have publicly burned them. This book is a feeble attempt to gather from the ashes of the past, some record of the dark ages when Africa was yet unpenetrated and unknown. Looking through these pages, questions may arise in the mind, as one catches occasional glimmers of Truth — the existence of a primary Cause — God the Creator — death entering the world as the result of sin — the per- sonality of evil that sought to destroy the work of the Creator — the shedding of blood for sacrifice — etc. ; and one asks if this is not a child-race whose instincts, God implanted, have become corrupt, because hitherto they have had no guide or instructor other than the Power of Darkness. In conclusion, I should like to express my deep grati- tude for the excellent portrait of Andereya Duhaga, king of Bunyoro, so graciously presented for publication by Her Royal Highness the Duchess DAosta, who paid a memorable visit to Andereya in his house while touring through the country in 1908.
Posted on: Sun, 18 May 2014 05:46:23 +0000
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