If a plate of food is given to
them, they hold it upside down. They remain dumb, indicating their
wants by signs only. All this is to show that they are still under
the influence of the devil or the spirits. Their sponsors have to
teach them all the common acts of life, as if they were newborn
children. Further, upon leaving the Kakian house the boys are
strictly forbidden to eat of certain fruits until the next
celebration of the rites has taken place. And for twenty or thirty
days their hair may not be combed by their mothers or sisters. At
the end of that time the high priest takes them to a lonely place in
the forest, and cuts off a lock of hair from the crown of each of
their heads. After these initiatory rites the lads are deemed men,
and may marry; it would be a scandal if they married before.
In the region of the Lower Congo a simulation of death and
resurrection is, or rather used to be, practised by the members of a
guild or secret society called _ndembo._ "In the practice of Ndembo
the initiating doctors get some one to fall down in a pretended fit,
and in that state he is carried away to an enclosed place outside
the town.
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