Not Only My Own Men But The Whole Of Ibrahim's Party Were Of Opinion
That I Had Some Mysterious Connection With The Disaster That Had
Befallen My Mutineers.
All remembered the bitterness of my prophecy,
"The vultures will pick their bones", and this terrible mishap having
occurred so immediately afterward took a strong hold upon their
superstitious minds.
As I passed through the camp the men would quietly
exclaim, "Wah Illahi Hawaga!" (My God, Master!) To which I simply
replied, "Robine fe!" (There is a God.) From that moment I observed an
extraordinary change in the manner of both my people and those of
Ibrahim, all of whom now paid us the greatest respect.
One day I sent for Commoro, the Latooka chief, and through my two young
interpreters I had a long conversation with him on the customs of his
country. I wished if possible to fathom the origin of the extraordinary
custom of exhuming the body after burial, as I imagined that in this act
some idea might be traced to a belief in the resurrection.
Commoro was, like all his people, extremely tall. Upon entering my tent
he took his seat upon the ground, the Latookas not using stools like the
other White Nile tribes. I commenced the conversation by complimenting
him on the perfection of his wives and daughters in a funeral dance
which had lately been held, and on his own agility in the performance,
and inquired for whom the ceremony had been performed. He replied that
it was for a man who had been recently killed, but no one of great
importance, the same ceremony being observed for every person without
distinction.
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