3-021-245 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Mr. S. W. Baker's explorations in Central Africa: Commoro, chief of the Latooka Tribe, 1865. 'The people inhabiting the Latooka country are the most powerful tribe Mr. Baker has found in Africa; and their Monarch is the illustrious warrior, Commoro, whose likeness is here delineated by Mr. Baker's pencil. Their country, situated in latitude about 4 deg. 24 min. north, is a very fine one, producing ample supplies of grain and supporting large herds. The towns are large and thickly populated, and the inhabitants are a warlike but friendly race, who go naked, and whose chief distinction is their hair, which they train into a kind of natural helmet...Like all the tribes of the White Nile, the Latookas seem entirely devoid of any idea of a Supreme Being. Indeed, the only difference between them and the beasts is that they can cook and light a fire...The chief was an old man, who was held to possess the power of producing or restraining rain by a magic whistle; but one day, Mr. Baker happening to whistle upon his fingers in a loud key, the natives assumed that he had a power to control the elements, and frequently called upon him to exercise it'. From "Illustrated London News", 1865.