A MAN CALLED THIEP, who was native of Sango, a town in the Oyo country, admired a girl called Lith very much. She lived in Oyo and he wished to marry her, as she was the finest girl in her kraal.

It was the custom in those days for the parents to demand such a large amount as dowry for their daughters that if, after they were married, they failed to get on with their husbands and could not redeem themselves, they were sold as slaves.

Thiep paid a very large sum as a dowry for Lith and she was put in the fatting-house until the proper time arrived for her to marry. Thiep told the parents that when their daughter was ready they must send her over to him. This they promised to do.

Lith’s father was a rich man. After seven years had elapsed and Lith came out of the fatting-house to go to her husband, her father saw a very fine girl, also just out of the fatting-house, whose parents wished to sell her as a slave. He therefore bought her and gave her to his daughter as her hands-maiden.

The next day Lith’s little sister, being very anxious to go with her, obtained the consent of her mother, and they started off together, the slave girl carrying a large bundle containing clothes and presents from Lith’s father. Thiep’s house was a long day’s march from where they lived. When they arrived just outside the town, they came to a spring where people used to get their drinking water. No one was allowed to bathe there. Lith, however, knew nothing of this. The women took off their clothes to wash close to the spring, where there was a deep hole which led to the water juju’s house. The slave girl knew of this juju and thought that, if she could get her mistress to bathe there, her mistress would be taken by the juju and she would then be able to take her place and marry Thiep. So they went down to bathe and, when they were close to the water, the slave girl pushed her mistress in, and Lith at once disappeared.

The little sister began to cry, but the slave girl said, “If you cry any more I shall kill you at once and throw your body into the hole after your sister.” She told the child that she must never mention what had happened to anyone, particularly not to Thiep, as she was going to take her sister’s place and marry him, and that if she ever told anyone what she had seen, she would be killed at once. She then made the little girl carry her load to Thiep’s house.

When they arrived, Thiep was very disappointed at the slave girl’s appearance, as she was not nearly as pretty and fine as he had expected her to be; but as he had not seen Lith for seven years, he had no suspicion that the girl was not really Lith for whom he had paid such a large dowry. He then called his society together to play and feast and, when they arrived, they were much astonished and said, “Is this the fine woman for whom you paid so great a dowry and whom you told us so much about ?” And Thiep could not answer them.

The slave girl was then for some time very cruel to Lith’s little sister and wanted her to die so that then her position would be more secure with her husband. Every day she beat the little girl, and she always made her carry the largest water-pot to the spring. She also made the child place her finger in the fire to use as firewood. When the time came for food, the slave girl went to the fire and took a burning piece of wood and burned the child all over her body with it. When Thiep asked her why she treated the child so badly, she replied that she was a slave whom her father had bought for her.

Now when the little girl took the heavy water-pot to the river to fill it, there was no one to lift it up for her, so that she could not get it up on her head. She therefore had to remain a long time at the spring and at last began calling for her sister Lith to come and help her.

When Lith heard her little sister crying for her, she begged the water juju to allow her to go and help her, so he told her she might go but that she must return to him again immediately. When the little girl saw her sister she did not want to leave her and asked to be allowed to go into the hole with her. She then told Lith how surely she had been treated by the slave girl, and her elder sister told her to have patience and wait, that a day of vengeance would arrive sooner or later.

After seeing her sister, the little girl went back to Thiep’s house with a glad heart, but when she got to the house, the slave girl said, “Why have you been so long getting the water?’ and took another stick from the fire and burned the little girl and starved her for the rest of the day.

This went on for sometime, until, one day, when the child again went to the river for water. After all the people had gone, she cried out for her sister, but for a long tIme she did not come. There was a hunter from Thiep’s town hidden nearby, watching the Lith hole, and the water juju told Lith that she must not go. When the little girl went on carrying so bitterly, Lith at last persuaded the juju to let her go to her sister, promising to return quickly. When she emerged from the water, she looked very beautiful with the rays of the setting sun shining on her glistening body. She helped her little sister with her water-pot and then disappeared into the hole again.

The hunter was amazed at what he had seen, and, when he returned, he told Thiep what a beautiful woman had come out of the water and had helped the little girl with her water-pot. He also told Thiep that he was convinced that the girl he had seen at the spring was his proper wife. Lith, and the water juju must have taken her.

Thiep then made up his mind to go out and watch and see what happened. So in the early morning, the hunter came for him, and they both went down to the river and hid in the forest near the waterhole.

When Thiep saw Lith come out of the water, he recognized her at once, and he went home and considered how he should get her out of the power of the water juju. He was advised by some of his friends to go to an old woman who frequently made sacrifices to the water juju, and consult her as to what the best thing to do.

When he went to her, she told him to bring her one white slave, one white goat, one piece of white cloth, one white chicken, and a basket of eggs. Then, when the great juju day arrived, she would take them to the water juju and make a sacrifice of them on his behalf. On the day after the sacrifice was made, the water juju would return the girl to her, and she would bring her to Thiep.

Thiep then bought the slave and took all the other things to the old woman and, when the day of sacrifice arrived, he went with his friend, the hunter, and witnessed the old woman make the sacrifice. The slave was bound up and led to the hole, the old woman called to the water juju, and she then cut the slave’s throat with a sharp knife and pushed him into the hole. She then did the same with the goat and the chicken and she also threw the eggs and cloth on top of them. After this had been done, they all returned to their homes.

The next morning at dawn the old woman went to the hole and found Lith standing at the side of the spring. She told her that she was her friend and was going to take her to her husband. She then took Lith back to her own home and hid her in her room and sent word to Thiep to come to her house and to take great care that the slave woman knew nothing about the matter.

So Thiep left the house secretly by the back door and arrived at the old woman’s house without meeting anyone.

When Lith saw Thiep, she asked for her little sister, so he sent his friend, the hunter, to bring her from the spring. The hunter met the child carrying her water-pot to get the morning supply of water and brought her to the old woman’s house with him.

After Lith had embraced her sister, she told her to return to Thiep’s house and to do something to annoy the slave woman, and then she went to run as fast as she could back to the old woman’s house where, no doubt, the slave girl would follow her. There she would meet them all inside the house and would see Lith, whom she believed she had killed.

The little girl did as she was told, and as soon as she entered the house, she called out to the slave woman, “Do you know that you are a wicked woman and have treated me very badly? I know you are only my sister’s slave, and you will be properly punished.” She then ran as fast as she could to the old woman’s house. When the slave woman heard what the little girl had said, she was quite mad with rage and seized a burning stick from the fire and ran after the child; but the little one got to the house first and ran inside, the slave woman following close upon her heels with the burning stick in her hand.

Then Lith came out and confronted the slave woman, and she at once recognized her mistress whom she thought she had killed, and she stood quite still.

Then they all went back to Thiep’s house, and when they arrived there, Thiep asked the slave woman what she meant by pretending that she was Lith and why she had tried to kill her. But, seeing she was found out, the slave woman had nothing to say.

Many people were then called to play and to celebrate the recovery of Thiep’s wife, and when they had all come, he told them what the slave woman had done.

After this, Lith treated the slave girl in the same way as she had treated her little sister. She made her put her fingers in the fire and burned her with sticks. She also made her beat fufu with her head in a hollowed-out tree and, after a time, she was tied up to a tree and starved to death.

Ever since that time, when a man marries a girl, he is always present when she comes out of the fatting-house and takes her home himself, so that such evil things as happened to Lith and her sister might not occur again.

[ EFIK-IBIBIO ]