Note 29 — V Vows, Votive and other Offerings

It is narrated29 by Moor that he “passed a tree, on which were hanging several hundred bells. This was a superstitious sacrifice by the Bandjanahs,30 who, passing this tree, are in the habit of hanging a bell or bells upon it, which they take from the necks of their sick cattle, expecting to leave behind them the complaint also. Our servants particularly cautioned us against touching these diabolical bells; but, as a few were taken for our own cattle, several accidents that happened were imputed to the anger of the deity to whom these offerings were made, who, they say, inflicts the same disorder on the unhappy bullock who carries a bell from this tree as he relieved the donor from.”