Haiti continued - The Traveller's Tree: A Journey Through the Caribbean Islands - page 166

Congo, who can only be summoned by drums and dances and sacrifices. They lurk in the air above the
palm roofs and peer down at the dancers in search of devotees in whom to incarnate themselves. The
atmosphere of the tonnelle was heavy with their impending presence.
There was a sudden flurried movement, and the ranks broke. In the space which was suddenly cleared,
a young man staggered, catching at the forearm of one of the houncis to prevent himself from falling. The
others ran to his help. He remained stiff and inert in their arms, with his mouth wide open and his eyes
revulsed, and one shoulder-blade gyrating at great speed, the shining black mesh of his shoulder muscles
shuddering with the lift of the bone. Two of the girls bent down and rolled up his trousers. Then, breaking
from his supporters, he began a staggering, unconscious dance in the middle of the tonnelle . The tempo
of the drumming changed to an ominous roll, and the Houngan followed his erratic progress, dipping his
açon into a can of water and sprinkling the dancer in the manner of a priest with a hyssoptwig. The young
man snatched the can from him and spilt three pools round the pillar and then one in front of each of the
drums, and, falling on his face, licked up the mud. The Houngenikon and the mambo took him in turn
by both hands, and pumped them up and down with the motion of Oranges and Lemons. He made a few
more steps and then, falling against the pillar, with his chest heaving as though it would break through
his ribs, he collapsed into the arms of the dancers. The houncis gently wiped his face with a red cloth and
his eyelids slowly fell, and his head sank to his breast. Covering his face with the cloth, they carried him,
with his feet dragging behind him, from the floor.
Just before his collapse, a universal cry had broken out, and the beat of the drums had again changed.
It was the beginning of an incarnation, and, by some mannerism in the dancing limbs of his human habit-
ation, the descended Lwa had been recognized. It was Ogoun Ferraille. The anthem of the War God burst
from every throat, and the dancers, crouching in a frog-like position with their knees almost touching
the floor, once more filled the tonnelle . They advanced once more, working their way slowly round each
other back to back, and then retreated quaking and stamping to their own sides. The Houngan, mean-
while, stooping before the pillar, was drawing in white maize-flour the vévér , or heraldic emblem of the
god. Filling his right hand, he turned the circle formed by closing his thumb and forefinger into a spout,
through which the white powder was poured. Then, with the speed and precision of a pastry cook with an
icing-funnel, he limned on the beaten dust the intricate white curves and triangles and loops and stars. The
invocation that accompanies this office makes curious reading: Par pouvoir St. Jacques Majeur, Ogoun
Badagris, nègre Baguido Bago, Ogoun Ferraille, nègre fer, nègre ferraille, nègre tagnifer nago, Ogoun
Batala, nègre, nègre batiocoue nago, Ogoun Achade Bokor, nègre gouegui malor, nègre Ossangne mal-
or, Ossangne Aquiquan, Ossangne Agouelingui, Jupiter tonnerre, nègre blabla, nègre oloncoun, nègre
vanté'm pasfiém. Aocher nago, Aocher nago, Aocher nago . Straightening up and blowing into the hollow
of his hand, he sent a white cloud of flour into the air.
The drums changed and the Houngenikon came dancing on to the floor, holding a vessel filled with
some burning liquid from which sprang blue and yellow flames. As he circled the pillar and spilt three
flaming libations, his steps began to falter. Then, lurching backwards with the same symptoms of deliri-
um that had manifested themselves in his forerunner, he flung down the whole blazing mass. The houn-
cis caught him as he reeled, and removed his sandals and rolled his trousers up, while the kerchief fell
from his head and laid bare his young woolly skull. The other houncis knelt to put their hands in the
flaming mud, and rub it over their hands and elbows and faces. The Houngan's bell and açon rattled offi-
ciously and the young priest was left by himself, reeling and colliding against the pillar, helplessly cata-
pulting across the floor, and falling among the drums. His eyes were shut, his forehead screwed up and