THE " NAILING " OF THE IDOL. [To TIM EDITOR
OV 41111 " SPRCT,STOR.1 SIR,—Your correspondent "H. M. G." refers to an African custom in which the driving of nails into an effigy of a person was intended to injure that person. I do not think that this
was always the case. Herr Schmid-Kraig, of Binn, Canton Valais, Switzerland, once told me the story of the Mazza, and I have recorded it, as I recollected it, in my Recollections of an Old Mountaineer :—
"In old days when the inhabitants of the Valais wore oppressed by robber-barons or‘the like [such as the Lords of Ravenna] they sometimes turned and resisted desperately. They met ; and one carried a head, carved in wood and painted, of sorrowful aspect. It was questioned : What ails thee, Maize ? Does any oppress thee ? Is it such-an-one ? ' If the name were wrong, the head was shaken. When the right name was suggested, the head was nodded. 'Then I will aid thee, Mazzo,' said one and another, and each drove a nail into the head to make it fool sure of help. When it had gone round, the sworn ones made for the castle and demolished it ; demolished the baron too."
Seine time after I had recorded this story I came across a reference to the Maize in M'Crackan's The Rise of the Swiss Republic. There was there no mention of the driving in of nails; but at any rate the effigy, as in Herr Schmid-Kraig's story, symbolized the person or cause to be supported and not the oppressor. If, then, the more detailed story, as related to me by this old Valaisan, be correct, it would seem as though the driving of nails into an image of von Hindenburg might mean "We will be true to you and back you up."—I am, Sir, WALTER LARDER.
[The present writer once saw at the rooms of Miss Mary Kingsley, that paragon of African explorers, a hideous black image, stuck all over like a porcupine with knife-blades. The image was the Goddess of Murder, and each blade represented a life taken—was, in fad, a votive offering. The image smelt a good deal, as many of the knives were not cleaned before being offered, but had the blood still on them. A British
official abolished the goddess and her worship, and presented the sanguinary juju to Miss Kingsley as a curio. Her friends advised its removal to the ampler air of a museum. It certainly was not a curiosity suitable to a London flat —ED. Spectator.]
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