According to them it was an evil spirit in the shape of an ape, which evil spirit had once inhabited the body of an early Kalubi, and had been annexed by the ape when it killed the said Kalubi.
Also they declared that the reason the creature put all the Kalubis to death, as well as a number of other people who were offered up to it, was that it needed "to refresh itself with the spirits of men," by which means it was enabled to avoid the effects of age.

It will be remembered that the Motombo referred to this belief, of which afterwards I heard in more detail from Babemba.

But if this god had anything supernatural about it, at least its magic was no shield against a bullet from a Purdey rifle.
Only a little way from the fallen tree we came suddenly upon a large clearing, which we guessed at once must be that "Garden of the god" where twice a year the unfortunate Kalubis were doomed to scatter the "sacred seed." It was a large garden, several acres of it, lying on a shelf, as it were, of the mountain and watered by a stream.

Maize grew in it, also other sorts of corn, while all round was a thick belt of plantain trees.

Of course these crops had formed the food of the god who, whenever it was hungry, came to this place and helped itself, as we could see by many signs.