STATE OF THE COAST PRIOR TO THE FOUNDATION OF LIBERIA—NATIVE TRIBES—CUSTOMS AND POLICY—POWER OF THE FOLGIAS—KROOMEN, ETC.—CONFLICTS.
The lands chosen as the site of the American colony excited attention in olden times. “Africa would be preferable to Europe,” said the French navigator Villault in 1667, “if it were all like Cape Mount.” He launches out with delight on the beauty of the prospects, and the richness of the country. He says, “There you find oranges, almonds, melons, pumpkins, cherries and plums,” and the abundance of animals was so great that the flesh was sold “for almost nothing.” Of the Rio Junco he remarks, “The banks are adorned with trees and flowers; and the plains with oranges, citrons and palms in beautiful clumps.” At Rio Cesters he found a people rigidly honest, who had carefully preserved the effects of a deceased trader, until a vessel arrived to receive them.
Another Frenchman, Desmarchais, in the succeeding century was invited by “King Peter” to form an establishment on the large island at Cape Mesurado, but he preferred the Cape itself, on account of the advantages of its position.
The country adjoining Mesurado, although subsequently harassed and wasted by the slave-trade, had in early times a national history and policy, containing incidents which illustrate the character of savage man as displayed in such social arrangements as his dull apprehension can contrive. This will be apparent from circumstances in its history during the sixteenth century.
The country was held chiefly by divisions of a great community, known by the common name of Monoo. The Gallas and the Veys were intruders, but nearly related. The Mandi, or head of the Monoo, retained reverence and dignity, but had lost dominion.
The subordinate tribes ranged themselves in rank, according to the power they possessed, which varied with temporary circumstances. Thus the Monoo lorded it over the Folgias; the Folgias over the Quojas, and the Quojas over the Bulams and Kondos.
Their fortresses were square inclosures, surrounded by stout palisades, driven close together, having four structures somewhat in the form of bastions, through which, and under their defence, were the entrances to the place. Two streets in the interior, crossing each other in the centre, connected these entrances. They had a kind of embrasures or port-holes in these wooden walls, out of which they threw assagays or spears and arrows.
Along the eastern bank of the Junco, stretched the lands of the Kharoo Monoos, the Kroomen so well known to our cruisers of the present day. The Folgias weakened in warfare had recourse to the sorceries of a celebrated performer in that line, whose policy in the case savored very greatly of earthly wisdom. He recommended religious strife as the best mode of weakening the enemy. They therefore contrived to excite some “old school and new school” controversy with regard to the sacredness of a pond held in reverence by the Kroos.
It was a matter of Kroo orthodoxy, that into this pond the great ancestor and author of their race had descended from heaven, and there first made his appearance as a man. Hence it was the faith of their established church to make offerings to the pond in favor of the fish that dwelt there.
Now it was also an old and ever-to-be-respected law among them, that no fish should be boiled with the scales on. Amid their career of victory, the audacious and criminal fact was one day discovered, that into the sacred pond, the just object of reverence to an enlightened and religious people, there had been thrown a quantity of fish boiled in a mode which indicated contempt for every thing praiseworthy and national, inasmuch as not a scale had been scraped off previously to their being boiled.
The nation got into a ferment about the fish-scales. From arguments they went to clubs and spears. Parties accusing and parties accused defended their lives, in “just and necessary wars,” while the Folgias looked on until both were weak enough to be conquered. The victors, however, were generous. Their chief married the sister of Flonikerri, the leader of the Kroos, and left him in sovereignty over his people. Flonikerri showed his loyalty by resisting an attack on the Folgias by the Quabo of the southeast.
In the mean time the great sovereign Mendino, king of the Monoos, had died; and as negro chiefs are or ought to be immortal, and as no king can die except by sorcery, his brother Manomassa was accused as having contrived his death. He drank the sassy-wood, and survived, without satisfying the people. As the sorcerers proposed to hold a kind of court of inquiry upon the case, Manomassa, indignant at the charge, surrendered himself to the care of the “spirits of the dead,” and went away among the Gala.
There his character gained him the office of chief. But annoyed at their subsequent caprice, he threw himself upon the generosity of the Folgias, who employed Flonikerri to reinstate him in his dominion over the Gala. Flonikerri had in fact become a kind of generalissimo of the united tribes. He was afterwards employed in subduing the Veys of Cape Mount; and after various battles, reduced them to offer proof of their submission. This consisted in each swallowing some drops of blood from a great number of chickens, which were afterwards boiled; they ate the flesh, reserving the legs, which were delivered to the conqueror, to be preserved as a memorial of their fealty.
Flonikerri fell in battle, resisting a revolt of the Galas. Being hard pressed, he drew a circle round him on the ground, vowing that within it he would resist or die. Kneeling there he expired under showers of arrows.
His brother and successor, Killimanzo, extended the authority of the tribe by subduing the Quilligas along the Gallinas river. The son of the latter, Flanseer, extended their conquests to Sierra Leone, crushed some rebellions, and left a respectable domain under the sway of his son Flamburi. Then it was that the energy, skill and vices of Europeans came powerfully into action among the contentions of the natives, until they rendered war a means of revenue, by making men an article of merchandise for exportation.
The same language prevailed among all their tribes. The most cultivated dialect was that of the Folgias, who prided themselves greatly on the propriety and the elegance of their speech, and on the figurative illustrations which they threw into it. They retained their supremacy over the Quojas, notwithstanding the extended dominion of the latter. This was indicated by the investiture of the chief of the Quojas with the title of Donda, by the king, or Donda, of the Folgias. The ceremony bore the character of abasement almost universal among the negro race. The Quoja aspirant, having approached the Folgia chief in solemn state, threw himself on the ground, remaining prostrate until the Folgian had thrown some dust over him. He was then asked the name he chose to bear. His attendants repeated it aloud. The king of the Folgians pronounced it, adding the title of Donda; and the whole multitude seized and shouted it with loud acclamations. He was invested with a bow and quiver. Mutual presents concluded the ceremony.
State and dignity, of such a character as could be found among savages, were strictly enforced in these old times. Ambassadors did not enter a territory until they had received permission, and until an officer had been sent to conduct them. There were receptions, and reviews, and stately marchings, trumpetings, drummings, and singing of songs, and acclamations, and flatteries.
The attendants of the ambassador prostrated themselves. He was only required to kneel, but, having bent his head in reverence, he wheeled round to the people, and drew the string of his bow to its full bent, indicating that he became the king’s soldier and defender. Then came his oration, which was repeated, sentence by sentence, in the mouth of the king’s interpreter. The Quojas claimed the credit of best understanding the proper ceremonies of civil life. How great is the difference between this population, and the few miserable slave-hunters, who subsequently ravaged, rather than possessed, these shores!