Return of The Ancestors
The movement included the belief that a 'Ghost Steamer' piloted by the returning dead, would arrive presently, bringing with it a cargo that included, besides departed relatives: tinned food, tools, various other resources, and in one version, guns with which to expel the white colonizers. The latter item is disputed, and may stem from the account of contemporary expatriate plantation owners, who were highly distressed by events.
Read more about this topic: Vailala Madness
Famous quotes containing the words return and/or ancestors:
“I find very reasonable the Celtic belief that the souls of our dearly departed are trapped in some inferior being, in an animal, a plant, an inanimate object, indeed lost to us until the day, which for some never arrives, when we find that we pass near the tree, or come to possess the object which is their prison. Then they quiver, call us, and as soon as we have recognized them, the spell is broken. Freed by us, they have vanquished death and return to live with us.”
—Marcel Proust (1871–1922)
“It is fortunate that each generation does not comprehend its own ignorance. We are thus enabled to call our ancestors barbarous.”
—Charles Dudley Warner (1829–1900)