LAND OF SPOOKS.

Waikato Times, Volume 98, Issue 15312, 13 August 1923, Page 6

LAND OF SPOOKS.

«STORIES OF ZANZIBAR,

A bishop whoso missionary function includes the exorcising of evil spirits from natives, is now in London. He is the Lord Bishop of Zanzibar, Dr. Frank Weston, who has come as chairman of the Anglo-CaWiolio Congress Movement week in London. The bishop, who lias been in Zanzibar 25 vears, described it as a land haunted and pervaded by belief in spirits ami full of strange manifestations. He "occasionally exorcises spirits" himself, and the results induce him lo think that the spirits actually existed in the natives or houses they were said lo inhabit. "On one occasion," said the bishop, "I was called to a mud and earth house in the Isle" of Pamba. Great pieces of earth were Hying about the house striking the roof ami falling about our heads. Earth ilew out ot the walls or the kitchen. Wo formed a cordon round (he house to make sure that no human agency was .at work The earth, however, continued 10 fall and a great piece from the roof fell on my head. I exorcised the house (by prayer) and the people in it and the earth stopped falling. A Djinn to Order. "There is no doubt that some of the natives become possessed of two personalities—their own and another. Two voices speak from Hie same mind. The troubling spirit is a special kind of creature called, the Djinn. Native medicine men supply the Djinn to households as a sort of safeguard. 11 is believed that it is only when the Djinn is ignored that he becomes troublesome." Describing the wedding customs ol one of the tribes, the bishop said that on the wedding day bride and bridegroom are confined in a house in the bride's village, and remain for five flavs without taking food or drink. Then thev go'to the bridegroom's villages, feast,' and sit in front of the bridegroom's house, holding hands. M'lerwards Hie bride is carried on a woman's bark into the forest, where tlic women of the village and the mothers of the bride and bridegroom Pc on their faces while the bride dances on their backs. Later the bridegroom is carried by a man to meet the bride.