HUMAN LEOPARDS

Evening Post, Volume CXII, Issue 152, 24 December 1926, Page 4

HUMAN LEOPARDS

CANNIBALISM IN AFRICA

SJECRET CAPTURE Of- VICTIMS

WHAT A WOMAN' EXPLOBER WBCOVJSiiKI*.

it. U vn-M UniiY/n that cannibalism still exists Mutiny v, fiy/r navn^c tribes In various* parts of M><; world, though in v.tmv,t;'[w;nt'.i; of the mutch of civilisation this horrUih', fitiuilku in ft/wluftlly being ,it.Mmj;<:'l out. Jt uti/1 prevails amo/i# aotrie of Uib Wbeii in the hir.t,i:rl<i7i'i of West fif.ric.tt, but ;>,% the iviioie of Uiis '/,-/.?,(, region :riow eornes un'Jsr the ti'imin'miTiit'ion of. various Kuropean countries in -the form of colonies, t!i« eating of human fit-sJ* has to J/<j carried out, aneretfy for fear of punishment at the hare].* of the wJiit« man's Government. f>,'t<ly i;oroUiy Mill«, in her lateifc book, "Th rough Liberia," give;: «orn« interesting information regarding scorel. cannibalism in the hinterland of that country. LuAy JJorothy Mills is oho of tho.vs ftrtterpT;*ing women who, a» the lexalf. of the rft.'itlftsii Bf/irif, produced ivy a life of Htrentjons fxetivity during the war, whfc.'f many thou-wr/ds Of women r/eTe employ* cl in auxiliary service* i.i connection with the combatant armies, have rfftvolop'j'l tho wanderlust. It mchwi to he the ambition, of th<:?,e e-nt&rprixiirjg l».'li(;« to jienetrate to jjarts of the globs where no white v/oman ha* ever set foot before. !Tn official qiiartfc/3 th«se ladies arc regarded as ax: iintoleraWe nuisance, for, although they are quite

'.villing to risk their lives in penetrating unhealthy jungles without an escort, or crossing pathless desert!!, and mingling with savage tribes of blacks or Arabs, precautions have to be taken for their safety, for Government officials in distant colonie3 that are oniy partly civilised know that if harr.i befalls these ladies some of the blame will be placed on the shoulders of those officials who allowed them to risk their lives.

Liberia, which is the s':cne of the latest venturesome journey of Lady Dorothy Mills, is one of the world's four republics administered by black races in imitation of white civilisation. The other three arc Haiti, San Domingo, and Cuba. Liberia, which is about half the size of Victoria (Australia), is situated on tho cuast of "West Africa, between the British Crown Colony of Sierra Leone and the French Colony of the Ivory Coast. It was founded a hundred years ago, as the result of a philanthropic movement in the United States to provide a home for freed slaves. These freed slaves were by r.o means welcomed by the native tribes in Liberia, and as the slaves themselves belonged originally to hundreds of different tribes, there was lack of national cohesion in the new republic. But some degree of civilisation has been established, and the United States exercises over this black republic a quasi-pater-nal supervision, and on several occasions has come to its financial aid. An American official is in charge of' the Beceivership of Customs at; the port of Monrovia, the capital cf Liberia.. The Christian negro population of the country is about 50,000, but the pagan tribes number over 1,000,000. Although the country extends 200 miles inland, only a coastal strip of about 20 miles is civilised.

The system of government is copied from that of the United States. There is a President, a Cabinet of si:: Ministers, and a Parliament, consisting of Senate and House of Bcpreiientatives. Tho constitution provides that all electors and Ministers must Tie of negro blood. Before the war, 70 per cent, of the trade of Liberia was in German hands, and the Germans had established a powerful wireless station at Monrovia, But after the United States declared war on Germany in February, 1917, Liberia followed in the footsteps of her foster-parent, and did the same. In consequenco of her participation in the war, Liberia was one of i;ho signatories of tho Treaty of Versailles, and ono of the foundation members of the League of Nations. I It was among the Manos tribe in the hinterland of Liberia that Lady. Dorohty Mills became awaro that cannibalism is still practised. Ths natives among this tribe who are addicted to ! cannibalism belong to a secret societyknown as the Human Leoparcls. They havo to carry out their disgusting practices in secret, because of feair of punishment at tho hands of the little armymaintained by the Government of Liberia. "Among the Manos, whose country I was now traversing, still survives the Leopard Society,'' she writes, "if I am to believe a number of district commissioners of variousi grades, | who spoke feelingly of their difficulties in dealing with them, and who showqd me, and permitted me to take photographs of convicted Leopard prisoners ! doing" a life sentence, giving mo their I biographies and the details and dates of j their arrests. Tho principle and work- | ings of tho. society, as those gontlemen explained them to me, are asi follows: — The membership of the society is a profound secret, oven to the rest of tho village or community; a man who is a Leopard would not breathe the fact oven to his wife, unless sho wore one also, and, though possibly she or his near family might know or sunpect it, no one would dare betray him. Normally he leads the life of. an ordinary peaceful townsman. At times appointed by some leader, the members disappear to some fastness in tho rcmoto bush, where they assume the kit they wear when at, play. They claub their chests .with white chalk and cover their backs with a close-fitting covering of supple' yellow open-work wicker, through the intca-stices of which their black skins can bo seen; sometimes I believe they covor their heads with leopard skin. On their hands they wear long curved claws of iron and thoy carry t: sharp spear. When they move they imitate the gait and noises of a leopard, bending, and crouching, and snarling; and an eye-witness—an assistant- district commisisoner—told me that at nighty in the thick bush at a short distance, it is hard to tell whether they are animal or human. There aro women among thorn sometimes, prdbably their concubines, possessing the same horriblo tastes, who attend to their needs and cook the "meat" brought to their hiding places. Thus equipped they go stealthily along the bush tracks in search of a victim; sometmesit may be an unwary traveller returning late to his home, sometimes a girl or woman washing her clothes in a stream, or again a man lingering lato in hisj farm outsido the village will climb a treo for fruit, while tho Leopards gather round silently in the darkness anil wait for him to descend. Theso victim? thoy carry off to their hiding places, keeping them there sometimes for days at a time, till ready to eat them."

"For safety's sake they generally confine themselves, to their own tribe. The members will offer and help to procure some one of their own family for sacrifice A man will offer up his wife, or Ins child, or his young brother; at the next session he will, demand from somo other momber a life in payment. Ono young official told mo that"in a small village in an outlying district, ho had been roused one night by cries of panic, and, going out, found that the "palaver kitchen" had suffered a lightning raid from an unrocognisablo band of .Leopards, who had succeeded in carrying off two victims, a man and a boy slooping there, under the very eyes of thoir friends. Any body that has boon buried they will dig up. at night and eat. I am inclinod to think that bodies already dead from natural causes .•?9JSH S°?!<l»F! *b» •£*»s« -diet of:

would be cannibals, for, though tha system, such as I have described, ip still carried out when possible,- it has beett drastically chastised since tho Government has succeeded in getting the' country under military control. Only, twice in tho course of my trip havo I had conversation with a man who actually admitted having eaten human flesh (though I have spoken to many who havo seen it done), and both of them spoke of the present prohibition with regret, and utterly without shame* or real consciousness of wrong-doing, as one speaks of the prohibition of drink. One of them told mo that among his people, the Jocquellehs, a woman's flesh. w»*B highly esteemed, and that in the old day« it bad been the custom to give i the upper part of the body to the crowd, but that the thighs were reserved for the, chief. Most tribes, however, do tt'A cunt for tho /lesh cf women, saying that it tastes bitter.. I asked him jokjr^iy v/hether he thought I would be goo<i eating, arid he assured me with the air of ?,-. connoisseur that the flesh of a wfcftft f,srs'/n, or of a civilised black' one, i;» acrid ami unpalatable, on acoanf. („. f.f.e quantity of salt that w« ooth eat -vrWh onr food," ' '