At forty most of them
become grey-haired and covered with wrinkles, and but few of them
survive the age of fifty-five or sixty.
They calculate the years of
their lives, as I have already observed, by the number of rainy
seasons (there being but one such in the year), and distinguish each
year by a particular name, founded on some remarkable occurrence
which happened in that year. Thus they say the year of the Farbanna
war - the year of the Kaarta war - the year on which Gadou was
plundered, etc., etc.; and I have no doubt that the year 1796 will
in many places be distinguished by the name of tobaubo tambi sang
(the year the white man passed), as such an occurrence would
naturally form an epoch in their traditional history.
But notwithstanding that longevity is uncommon among them, it
appeared to me that their diseases are but few in number. Their
simple diet and active way of life preserve them from many of those
disorders which embitter the days of luxury and idleness. Fevers
and fluxes are the most common and the most fatal. For these they
generally apply saphies to different parts of the body, and perform
a great many other superstitious ceremonies - some of which are
indeed well calculated to inspire the patient with the hope of
recovery, and divert his mind from brooding over his own danger - but
I have sometimes observed among them a more systematic mode of
treatment. On the first attack of a fever, when the patient
complains of cold, he is frequently placed in a sort of vapour-bath.
This is done by spreading branches of the nauclea orientalis upon
hot wood embers, and laying the patient upon them, wrapped up in a
large cotton cloth. Water is then sprinkled upon the branches,
which, descending to the hot embers, soon covers the patient with a
cloud of vapour, in which he is allowed to remain until the embers
are almost extinguished. This practice commonly produces a profuse
perspiration, and wonderfully relieves the sufferer.
For the dysentery they use the bark of different trees reduced to
powder and mixed with the patient's food; but this practice is in
general very unsuccessful.
The other diseases which prevail among the negroes are the yaws, the
elephantiasis, and a leprosy of the very worst kind. This last-
mentioned complaint appears at the beginning in scurfy spots upon
different parts of the body, which finally settle upon the hands or
feet, where the skin becomes withered, and, cracks in many places.
At length the ends of the fingers swell and ulcerate, the discharge
is acrid and fetid, the nails drop off, and the bones of the fingers
become carious, and separate at the joints. In this manner the
disease continues to spread, frequently until the patient loses all
his fingers and toes. Even the hands and feet are sometimes
destroyed by this inveterate malady, to which the negroes give the
name of balla ou (incurable).
The guinea worm is likewise very common in certain places,
especially at the commencement of the rainy season. The negroes
attribute this disease, which has been described by many writers, to
bad water, and allege that the people who drink from wells are more
subject to it than those who drink from streams. To the same cause
they attribute the swelling of the glands of the neck (goitres),
which are very common in some parts of Bambarra. I observed also,
in the interior countries, a few instances of simple gonorrhoea, but
never the confirmed lues. On the whole, it appeared to me that the
negroes are better surgeons than physicians. I found them very
successful in their management of fractures and dislocations, and
their splints and bandages are simple and easily removed. The
patient is laid upon a soft mat, and the fractured limb is
frequently bathed with cold water. All abscesses they open with the
actual cautery, and the dressings are composed of either soft
leaves, shea butter, or cow's dung, as the case seems in their
judgment to require. Towards the coast, where a supply of European
lancets can be procured, they sometimes perform phlebotomy, and in
cases of local inflammation a curious sort of cupping is practised.
This operation is performed by making incisions in the part, and
applying to it a bullock's horn with a small hole in the end. The
operator then takes a piece of bee's wax in his mouth, and, putting
his lips to the hole, extracts the air from the horn, and by a
dexterous use of his tongue stops up the hole with the wax. This
method is found to answer the purpose, and in general produces a
plentiful discharge.
When a person of consequence dies, the relations and neighbours meet
together and manifest their sorrow by loud and dismal howlings. A
bullock or goat is killed for such persons as come to assist at the
funeral, which generally takes place in the evening of the same day
on which the party died. The negroes have no appropriate burial-
places, and frequently dig the grave in the floor of the deceased's
hut, or in the shade of a favourite tree. The body is dressed in
white cotton, and wrapped up in a mat. It is carried to the grave
in the dusk of the evening by the relations. If the grave is
without the walls of the town a number of prickly bushes are laid
upon it to prevent the wolves from digging up the body; but I never
observed that any stone was placed over the grave as a monument or
memorial.
Of their music and dances some account has incidentally been given
in different parts of my journal. On the first of these heads I
have now to add a list of their musical instruments, the principal
of which are - the koonting, a sort of guitar with three strings; the
korro, a large harp with eighteen strings; the simbing, a small harp
with seven strings; the balafou, an instrument composed of twenty
pieces of hard wood of different lengths, with the shells of gourds
hung underneath to increase the sound; the tangtang, a drum open at
the lower end; and, lastly, the tabala, a large drum, commonly used
to spread an alarm through the country.
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