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C: Yee. He said that it is the parent himself who has caught the child. |
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D: Yee. When you go and get a child [bride for a son], you bring her, and she gives birth to a child, that is also yours. . . . This is a grandchildand you also answered that when you go and produce a child and it also produces, that one is also your child. |
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C: And it is why I say that person [the curser] must not hide, he should come in public, he should not hide, a person who just comes to kill, that one always hides that he has come to kill. |
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D (gourd rattles): This case which this man is starting on, he says, thank you for bringing the case. But you are a Nyole. When you get a seed and give your friend, whether of cowpeas or of millet, you say, my friend, here is millet, go and sow. At planting time, he sows and that millet yields abundantly, and when he repays the loan, doesn't he repay extra [with interest]? That is where my case came from. |
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C: What I haven't yet learned is thisthe person who has come to make a case with me here in this roomis it my co-parent-in-law or his brother? |
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D (gourd rattles): . . . let him know that I am the in-law who is called the brother of his real co-parent-in-law. |
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C: But how did that case come? |
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D (gourd rattles): Now I am going to tell him the facts. When you get a goat and you give to your brotheryou get a cow and give to your brotherand he goes to buy a person and later with luck she produces a child for which bridewealth is paiddoes he repay the goat or doesn't he? Does he repay that cow or doesn't he? And if he doesn't repay it, don't you quarrel? That is the millet which I have talked about saying I have given him millet seed to go and sow and it yielded abundantly and can't he repay with interest. |
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C: Ah, for me, I say let Gassani [here meaning the divining spirit] reconsider. They came, but I think they are deceiving me about that debt. Perhaps there is another case. If he is deceiving me in bringing this one, for me I still refuse. |
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D: You refuse this case? |
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C: Yes. |
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D (gourd rattles): This man is asking youtrue you are saying that he should step aside. And yet, he says, were you there long ago? Did you know what happened in their home? |
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C: You people had sisters, and everyone was given his share from his sisterand everyone was assigned a sister. |
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D (gourd rattles): He says that it is true, we had our sisters, I'm not denying that. But if you have your sister and she goes to marry and the bridewealth they pay is little, and then when you go to marry and they negotiate a bridewealth that is greater than the one paid for your sister, and your brother sees that you fall short and he has something, doesn't he give to you? |
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C: He can give you . . . but the things of your home, I know them. |
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D (gourd rattles): This one is saying that you are lying. He says that he gave this person an animal for bridewealth. He is speaking for naught [that is, groundlesslyhe himself is lying]. |
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C: Now you go away and if there are others, let them too come. I shall ask them. They themselves will be the ones to show me the way. |
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D (gourd rattles): These men might be telling falsehoods here. Maybe they have |
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