Among the natives of the Bebedeben neighbourhood eels are supposed to be the cause of conceptions. An eel '… will only approach a woman soon after intercourse, when the "smell" is still upon her. Thus stimulated, it enters her vagina and itself copulates with her (the woman herself remaining in ignorance), and finally withdraws, leaving behind the greasy deposit such as a man finds on his hands after attempting to hold one of these creatures'. There is some evidence that the eel is also identified with the baby before its birth. [Thus the refusal to believe in physical paternity would seem to amount to the unconscious assertion: 'It is not my penis, but my father's (the eel), which makes (or turns into) the child'.]