Moreover, I was told that now, at any rate, the people regard their _imbele_ or clan relationship as a social one, as well as one of actual blood, a statement which is illustrated by the fact that, if a member of one clan leaves his village to reside permanently in a village of another clan, he will regard the members of the latter clan, and will himself be regarded by them, as being _imbele_, although he does not part with the continuing _imbele_ connection between himself and the other members of his original clan.
On the other hand the association between members of a clan is exceedingly close, so much so that a serious injury done by an outsider to one member of a clan (_e.g._, his murder, or the case of his wife eloping with a stranger and her family refusing to compensate him for the price which he had paid for her on marriage) is taken up by the entire clan, who will join the injured individual in full force to inflict retribution; and, as already stated, the members of a clan share in one common chief and one common _emone_, intermarriage between them is regarded as wrong, and apparently each group of villages occupied by a single clan has in origin been a single village, and may well have a common descent. I think, therefore, that I am justified in regarding these internal sections of a community as clans.
Chiefs, Sub-Chiefs and Notables and Their Emone
At the head of each clan is the _amidi_, or chief of the clan. He is, and is recognised as being, the only true chief.
He is the most important personage of his clan, and is treated with the respect due to his office; but, though he takes a leading part in all matters affecting the clan, he is not a person with any administrative or judicial functions, and he has no power of punishment or control over the members of the clan. In public ceremonial matters of importance, however, he has functions which rest primarily upon him alone, and he does, in fact, always perform these functions in his own village; and on the occasion of a big feast (as to which see below), he does so in whatever village of the clan that feast may be held.
The chief lives in one of the villages of the clan, but may have houses in other villages of that clan also. In the village in which he mainly resides is his _emone_ or club-house, which is the only true _emone_ of the clan; and for the upkeep and repair of this he is responsible. This is the ceremonial _emone_ in his own village, and is always the one used in connection with the ceremony of a big feast in any village of the clan; and, if the feast be held in a village other than that in which is his then existing _emone_, another one is built in that village in lieu of his former one in the other village.