Note 80 — Chapter IV

The different states of the water side revere different animals as fetish: the hyæna is esteemed so at Accra, the alligator at Dix Cove and Annamaboe, and vultures universally; and with more apparent reason, as they consume all the offal of the neighbourhood, and thus contribute to its health and cleanliness. A black man killing a hyæna at Accra, would incur a serious penalty. A European is obliged to pay a case of neat rum and one piece of white baft, in which the head of the animal is wrapped, and afterwards buried by the natives. Almost every resident on the coast, can speak to the imitative powers of the hyæna, which Pliny has been ridiculed for reporting. In a fresh water pond at Dix Cove, there is an alligator, about twelve feet long, which always appears on the bank, at the call of the fetish men, who then throw it a white fowl. In a modern natural history, I read, “in this part of the world (Africa) also, as well as at Siam, the crocodile makes an object of savage pomp, near the palaces of their monarchs. Philips informs us, that at Sabi, on the slave coast, there are two pools of water near the royal palace, where crocodiles are bred as we breed carp in our ponds in Europe.” I never heard of any royal palaces, or of Sabi (probably Assaboo) on the Slave Coast; the alligator of Dix Cove may possibly be alluded to.