of
course the sick man recovers. But should the patient die, the miscreant
who did him to death by kidnapping his soul or his liver will be sold as
a slave or choked.[42] In like manner the Bakerewe, who inhabit the
largest island in the Victoria Nyanza lake, believe that all deaths and
all ailments, however trivial, are the effect of witchcraft; and the
person, generally an old woman, whom the witch-doctor accuses of having
cast the spell on the patient is tied up, severely beaten, or stabbed to
death on the spot.[43] Again, we are told that "the peoples of the Congo
do not believe in a natural death, not even when it happens through
drowning or any other accident. Whoever dies is the victim of witchcraft
or of a spell. His soul has been eaten. He must be avenged by the
punishment of the person who has committed the crime." Accordingly when
a death has taken place, the medicine-man is sent for to discover the
criminal. He pretends to be possessed by a spirit and in this state he
names the wretch who has caused the death by sorcery. The accused has to
submit to the poison ordeal by drinking a decoction of the red bark of
the _Erythrophloeum guiniense_. If he vomits up the poison, he is
innocent; but if he fails to do so, the infuriated crowd rushes on him
and despatches him with knives and clubs. The family of the supposed
culprit has moreover to pay an indemnity to the family of the supposed
victim.[44] "Death, in the opinion of the natives, is never due to a
natural cause. It is always the result either of a crime or of sorcery,
and is followed by the poison ordeal, which has to be undergone by an
innocent person whom the fetish-man accuses from selfish motives."[45]

[Sidenote: Effect of such beliefs in thinning the population by causing
multitudes to die for the imaginary crime of sorcery.]

Evidence of the same sort could be multiplied for West Africa, where the
fear of sorcery is rampant.[46] But without going into further details,
I wish to point out the disastrous effects which here, as elsewhere,
this theory of death has produced upon the population. For when a death
from natural causes takes place, the author of the death being of course
unknown, suspicion often falls on a number of people, all of whom are
obliged to submit to the poison ordeal in order to prove their
innocence, with the result that some or possibly all of them perish. A
very experienced American missionary in West Africa, the Rev. R. H.
Nas