CHAPTER XII

AMONG THE SUMBU SAVAGES

We carried out our intention, as narrated at the end of the last chapter, and stayed at Sumbu several days, making short excursions into the surrounding country, and a dash north-east as far as the French frontier. We have now traversed Togoland from end to end, and I can flatter myself that I am at all events the first white woman to go farther than Sokode, and only one or two, at most, have ever been so far as that.

The people about here are a very wild and mixed lot. Besides the native Tschokossi, who are indigenous to the soil, so to speak, there are many others--Gourma people from the northern plains, Fulani from the central Sudan, Ashantis from the neighbouring British dominions, and Dahomeyans from across the French international boundary, with a sprinkling of individuals belonging to other tribes and peoples from various districts and states, who, for reasons best known to themselves, have sought sanctuary, as it were, in this remote and seldom-visited region, within comparatively easy reach of three different frontiers.

On the afternoon after our arrival the men went out shooting, and I noticed directly that our boys kept close round my tent, and that their usually merry countenances wore an exceedingly staid, not to say sombre, aspect. As this was so entirely unlike their conduct under normal circumstances, I asked them the reason for it. They answered that they were afraid to venture outside the camp. "People here," they said, "very bad people; they very much kill."

This was not very reassuring, and when Messa, the cook, came presently to tell me that he was unable to get any fowls, the interpreter having reported that the people in the village refused to sell, I felt rather uneasy. From where I was, I could see the natives sitting about outside their huts, each one with his bow and quiver of poisoned arrows beside him.

However, I reflected that I had to get dinner somehow against the return of the hunters, so calling the cook I ordered him to come with me to the village. At first he refused, saying that he was frightened. But I told him that if a woman could go there, surely a man could, and eventually he consented, very reluctantly, to accompany me. When we approached the place, the children all ran away screaming. This did not trouble me greatly. I had become used to it. What I did not like was that the women, in obedience to gestures from their men-folk, also went away--where I could not see. This I interpreted as a pretty bad sign, for it is well known that the African natives invariably send away their women and children when mischief is brewing. The men sat still, and scowled at us in silence, making no move, and speaking no word.

At this moment I must confess to feeling very frightened. I remembered the gruesome incident of the white man and the poisoned arrows. The affair had happened quite close to where I then was. It was likely, indeed probable, that some of these very men who sat there scowling at me, had been concerned in that cowardly and treacherous attack. However, I reflected that having adventured myself amongst them I had got to brazen it out. It would never do now to show the white feather, for if we retreated we must of necessity turn our backs upon them--we could not very well retire facing them and walking backwards all the way to the camp--and a flight of arrows let fly on the impulse of the moment would mean the end of the pair of us.

So, stalking along till I came close up to them, I said, addressing one of the biggest of the groups of squatting negroes, that I wished to buy a fowl. Nobody took the slightest notice. I waited a matter of thirty seconds or so, then fixing one of the least truculent-looking of the savages with my eyes, I addressed my request to him personally. I told him that I wanted a chicken, that I was willing to pay anything within reason for a chicken, but that a chicken I must have. Thereupon the man rose, caught a fowl, and handed it to me, still without speaking.

I had not brought with me any salt--the usual currency of the country--so I gave him a whole sixpence in cash. It was probably the first coined money that he, or any of those sitting near him, had ever seen. Everybody pressed round to examine it, and everybody started to express his opinion concerning it. The jabbering was terrific, and hearing the din the women came running up, and even the children ventured near, their wide-open eyes fixed in staring astonishment at the stranger white woman who had dropped from the skies, as it were, into their village, in order to bargain for chickens with tiny bits of metal. Eventually, after being passed from hand to hand all round the circle, the sixpence was returned to me by the man to whom I had originally tendered it, and who now, opening his mouth for the first time, condescended to explain that the price of his chicken was half a cupful of salt--_i.e._ about three-halfpence. I told him that the sixpence I had given him was worth two whole cupfuls of salt, and ought therefore by rights to purchase four chickens, taking the birds at his own valuation, but that as he had been the only one to oblige me by selling me what I wanted, he could keep the sixpence and I would keep the bird.

He shook his head. Obviously he did not believe me. Most likely he thought I was trying to obtain his valuable chicken in exchange for a worthless fragment of metal, which, assuming him to be fool enough to accept it, his wife would promptly annex as a neck ornament, and which, even at that, would not be much of an ornament. Luckily at this juncture a much-travelled native from a neighbouring village--he had once been as far as Mangu--put in an appearance, and on being appealed to, and after an examination of the sixpence, was able to confirm to his fellows my statement as to the seemingly fabulous value of the coin. At once the spell was broken. Obviously a person who, like myself, was willing to buy chickens at four times the ordinary market rates, was an individual whose acquaintance was worth cultivating.

From being almost openly hostile, the villagers went to the other extreme, and became embarrassingly friendly. Everybody crowded round, the women especially evincing the liveliest curiosity. They felt my clothes, my arms, my neck, my hair; especially my hair, bombarding me with questions concerning it meanwhile. Was it all my own? Did all white women's hair grow straight like mine? What made it so shiny? Did I put palm oil on it? These, and other even more delicate questions concerning the inner mysteries of my toilet, were flung at me by all and sundry. To distract their attention from the subject, I picked up and fondled a little urchin of three, or thereabouts. At once every woman in the place ran to fetch her own offspring, and held them up for my approval and admiration. A happy thought struck me. I had in my pocket several lumps of sugar, which I carried about with me to give to the horses. Taking them out, I distributed them amongst the nearest children. They took them, but had evidently no idea what to do with them. One little girl, placing her lump in a calabash, started to bore a hole in it with a thin piece of pointed iron, like a skewer, obviously with the intention of hanging it round her neck as a charm, and seemed greatly disappointed and annoyed when it broke into several pieces. Meanwhile, I had bitten a lump I had reserved for myself in halves, and putting one part in my mouth, handed the other half to a little boy standing near me, who, greatly daring, licked it. His delight was promptly manifested in his face. I doubt whether Charles Lamb's mythical Chinaman showed a more intense appreciation of the flavour of roast pig, when tasting it for the first time, than did this little Tschokossi savage on first sampling sugar. After indulging in several more licks, he handed it to his mother, who started licking it in her turn; and who, like her child, showed her manifest appreciation of the delicacy after the first lick. Other women were not slow to follow her example. Soon the place was full of women and children licking lumps of sugar, the novel delicacies being passed from hand to hand, and from mouth to mouth, the recipients meanwhile "ul-ul-ulling" in gleeful anticipation and excitement. After this little episode, whenever I showed my face in Sumbu, I was sure to be followed by crowds of children, begging for some of my "white honey rock," as they not inaptly christened it.

The ice once broken, I became very friendly with the Sumbu people, so much so that I asked the chief to show me over his village. He readily agreed. It was a most extraordinary place, unlike any I had ever seen or heard of, and merits a detailed description. The village itself is egg-shaped, the huts round, and placed closely together, not more than two yards apart, all round the rim of the oval, the roofs overlapping in such a manner that the edges of the opposite down-sloping eaves practically meet at a height of about three feet from the ground. The huts are completely joined together all the way round by two walls, an outer wall and an inner wall, the same height as the huts, the outer wall protected by thorn bushes. The entrance hole--one cannot call it a door--to each hut is two feet from the ground, is round in shape, and of a diameter just sufficiently large to allow a full-grown native to squeeze through feet foremost. The only entrance to the village is through a fair-sized doorway in a big hut at one extremity of the oval. This big hut is a sort of communal one, and is used, as regards one side of it, for the women to grind the corn on stones placed upon a hard clay platform the height of a table; and as regards the other side, as a sort of club-room for the men to sit in during the rainy season in the daytime, and as a stable for the sheep and goats at night. At the opposite end of this big hut is a second fair-sized doorway giving access to a courtyard. From the level of the first two huts (see plan) to right and left of the big communal hut a straight wall is carried right across from wall to wall, dividing the inner egg-shaped inclosure into two unequal portions, the larger portion being on the far side of the wall. This intersecting wall has a doorway in the centre through which admission is secured to the other further portion of the inclosure, and from this far inclosure only can access be had to the huts.

And not even then directly. When I arrived in this inner space, after being politely conducted by the chief through the communal hut, and across the courtyard, I naturally thought to see some signs of human habitation, and looked round for the doors of the dwelling-places. To my great surprise, however, there was nothing to be seen but the bare inner wall; and the chief, his eyes twinkling at my obvious bewilderment, presently reared against this a forked stick, and motioned me to climb up it, using it in fact as a ladder. I did so, though not without some slight misgiving, and stepping over, and down the other side, I found myself in a sort of well-like space between the inner and outer walls and two of the huts. From here only could access be had to the actual dwelling-places of the Tschokossi, through the small round holes mentioned above, and which were placed close up under the low overhanging eaves. Even, however, after squeezing one's body through this hole, one has not yet reached the actual interior of one of the houses. One is faced by yet another blank wall, round which one has to negotiate a careful passage in pitch darkness. This inner wall is intended to prevent anybody from creeping in under cover of darkness, and shooting off poisoned arrows amongst the sleepers inside, a pleasant practice to which both the Tschokossi and the Gourma are said to be only too frequently addicted. The whole series of elaborate precautions dates from the days when inter-tribal warfare, instead of being sporadic, was endemic. Every one of these villages is in fact a fortress, and every house is a fort. To storm such a place would be exceedingly difficult, at least for savages armed only with bows and arrows; to surprise it would be impossible, especially in view of the fact that the two blank spaces contained between the outer and inner walls and the big communal entrance hut and the two nearest to it on either side, are utilised to keep chickens in, and these creatures would at once give notice, by their unwonted commotion, of the presence of an intruder. The natives dwelling near Mangu, as well, of course, as those living to the south of it, have now entirely given up building these fortress villages, the necessity for them having ceased to exist. Nor is it likely that even the Tschokossi of the extreme north of Togo will build any more, when those they are now dwelling in are abandoned, or fall into ruin. I learned later that these Tschokossi people are supposed to have learnt the art of building these curious villages from the Gourma people, with whom they are intermixed.

I forgot to say that after I had bought the chicken, and had handed it to Messa, at the same time telling him that I was about to go inside the village at the chief's invitation, he tried earnestly to dissuade me from doing anything of the sort. "Oh, but I am going," I replied, "and you will come with me." Whereupon he threw up his hands with an expressive gesture, and declared that he was afraid. "I will go and call Alfred," he suddenly ejaculated, after a few moments' cogitation, "him big man, him no frightened," and off he went at a great pace, before I could stop him. Alfred, I may explain, was our chief interpreter, and stood six feet three inches in his bare feet.

Well, I waited for him to put in an appearance until I grew tired; then I went alone into the village, to the great delight of the old chief, who seemed vastly to appreciate my reposing such implicit confidence in him, and started off explaining everything to me with great volubility. Of course I could not understand a word of what he said, so on second thoughts I decided to go outside again and wait until Alfred turned up. This he did soon afterwards, walking very slowly and reluctantly, and evincing the greatest indisposition to come with me into the village. At length I got angry with him. "Surely," I said, "if a little slip of a girl like me is not afraid, a long slab of misery like you ought not to be"; and I wound up by threatening to report him to Schomburgk. Only then did he agree very unwillingly to accompany me, at the same time protesting so solemnly and earnestly against the "terrible risks" we were running, that once the thought did flash through my mind that my insistence on the enterprise might possibly turn out to be yet another example of the danger of fools rushing in where angels fear to tread. "But then," I reflected, "I am no fool, and Messa is most certainly not an angel"; and I thereupon took my courage in both hands, and in we went, with what result I have already stated. I was greatly pleased and excited at my discovery of this extraordinary village, as also was Schomburgk when I told him about it. It was, he agreed, one more fact added to our anthropological knowledge of darkest Africa; and of a kind, moreover, regarding which nothing has ever before appeared in print.

After this little episode we never had any difficulty during our stay there in getting plenty of chickens from the people at the ordinary market rates, which shows, to me at all events, that by firmness, mixed with kindness, one can do a lot with natives, even very wild ones. Our camp is on a high plateau, very picturesque, and commanding a quite extensive view over the high rolling veldt. Provisions are plentiful, with the exception of eggs, which are scarce just now. The Fulani, however, still continue to bring us milk, and butter for cooking. As their village lies at a much lower elevation than our camp, I am able to see them coming a long way off, and their first advent upon the scene is the signal to begin to get breakfast ready. We use the milk for our porridge and our coffee, but it is always very dirty. Tolstoy was right when he wrote that cleanliness is the hallmark of the classes the world over. The lower down, the dirtier! Most of these people, for instance, are simply filthy, possessing not even the most rudimentary notions of cleanliness. They defecate promiscuously in the neighbourhood of their villages, and they throw out their garbage anywhere. One result is a plague of flies, which settle everywhere, and must be ideal breeders and carriers of disease under the circumstances. At first I was really afraid to use the milk they brought. But by straining it through a clean cloth, and then boiling it, I have managed so far to ward off any ill effects. I have to pay these people in salt for all the milk, butter, and eggs they bring; they absolutely refuse to accept coined money. The rate of exchange has been fixed at one cupful of salt for each big calabash of milk, and the same for a pat of butter. They bring so much milk at one time, that there is quite a lot left over, and the happy thought struck me to make cheese of it. I put it in a big basin, allowed the cream to rise, skimmed it off, put it in a serviette, and hung it up in the branches of a tree. The result was an excellent cream cheese, which, after I added some salt and carraway seeds to it to give it a flavour, proved to be quite nice and palatable. I tried it first on Schomburgk, who liked it immensely. "Who made it?" he asked. "I did," I answered, quite proud, as what woman would not be, of my achievement. "Good!" he cried. "Give me another helping." Presently Hodgson came along. "Have some cheese?" I said. Hodgson eyed the dainty doubtfully, thinking it to be of native manufacture, and he had a rooted aversion and prejudice--not altogether unreasonable under the circumstances--against any article of native-made food. "Who made it?" he demanded, using Schomburgk's exact words. I was just about to answer him as I had answered Schomburgk, when the latter kicked me violently under the table. I understood, and my lips framed the ready lie. "Oh, the cook, I suppose," I answered carelessly. "Then I don't want any," he replied decisively. Whereat Schomburgk kicked me again under the table, but appreciatively this time; and we finished the rest of the cheese together. Then we both started laughing, and Hodgson grew quite angry, because he didn't know what the joke was. He knows now, however; or he will, at all events, when he comes to read this book.

I had other domestic troubles at Sumbu, in addition to culinary ones. Washing-day was a great trial. Our "washerwoman" was a boy, if you please, and said "boy" was a man, which sounds rather paradoxical, but you will find it is quite right, dear reader, and good sense, if you stop to think for a minute. Well, this boy, or man, or "washerwoman," whichever you please, had one fixed idea as regards the cleansing of clothes, and that idea was the one underlying, according to the old English proverb, the correct treatment of "a woman, a dog, and a walnut tree," as regards all three of which we are assured that "the more you beat 'em the better they be." Only I am convinced that neither woman, nor dog, nor walnut tree could possibly have stood, for any but the briefest period, the terrible beatings that our boy subjected our clothes to. He was a small, undersized man, but very strong and energetic, and with fists like ginger-beer bottles, and he used to pound and tear my delicate lingerie into shreds with his iron-shod paws, as a preliminary to hammering it to pulp on a big chunk of rough stone. Eventually Schomburgk raised his wages, on condition that he didn't work so hard; the first time on record, I suppose, that an employer has so acted. The result was disastrous. From that moment he ceased to take any interest whatever in his washing operations. He just trailed the soiled things in the river for a few minutes, and took them out again. When I, in despair at getting them cleansed, but hopeful of getting them at least smoothed out, suggested damping them down, and ironing them, he compromised matters with his conscience by ironing them wet. "What is the good," he exclaimed when I expostulated with him, "of first drying things, and then wetting them again, in order to dry them yet again with hot irons?" Such logic, regarded merely as logic, was unanswerable, and I was wise enough to at least refrain from attempting the obviously impossible.

There were a lot of old people in Sumbu. As a rule one sees few such in Africa. One old chap I especially remember. He used to sit in front of his hut all day, a mere living skeleton, only skin and bones. He looked exactly like a shrivelled-up monkey, or a mummy out of the British Museum. One day, taking pity on him, I gave a woman a lump of sugar to give to him. After he had eaten it, to my unbounded amazement he scrambled to his feet and executed a sort of impromptu war-dance. Later on he told our interpreter that he was now willing to die, having eaten of the white woman's honey rock. The phrase sounds new, but it isn't. It is merely one more variant of the "fate-cannot-harm-me-I-have-dined-to-day" wheeze.

The chief of Sumbu, the same who conducted me over his village, is the ugliest man I ever set eyes on, even in Africa, which is saying a good deal. He was so surpassingly ugly, so perfectly and preposterously hideous, that we took a cinema picture of him. We did not, however, think it necessary to explain to him our real reason for wishing to photograph him. On the contrary, we told him that it was because, besides being the northernmost chief in Togo we had visited, he was also the handsomest, and Europe would be inconsolable if it were to be deprived of possessing a pictorial record of an individual at once so distinguished and so beautiful. Hodgson, our operator, hung back for a while. He said he was afraid the chief's face might break the camera. It didn't. But I am inclined to think that it was a near thing. In justice to the chief, I feel I ought to add that not quite all his ugliness was natural to him, so to speak. It was due in part to his having been pitted by smallpox. He was badly pitted, too. His face would have made a very good cribbage-board, but regarded as a face it was a failure. Even, however, if he had never been pitted, I am inclined to think he would have been sufficiently ugly to have carried off the wooden spoon at even the least exacting of beauty shows. He reminded me of the ugly man immortalised by Mark Twain, who, after having the smallpox ever so bad, was just as handsome as he was before.

In addition to being very ugly, the chief was also very dirty. So were all his people. In fact the Sumbu Tschokossi are about the filthiest lot of savages I have come across up till now. It was only twenty minutes to the river, yet even the younger men's bodies were always grey with ashes, sand, and dirt, and covered with vermin. The women were much more clean to look upon, probably because it was their custom to bathe each day when they went to the river in the morning for water. The younger girls wear brightly polished brass armlets round their wrists and forearms, and the contrasts of these ornaments with their ebony skins, and the green leaves they wear before and behind, is exceedingly effective. Some of the very young unmarried ones are not unbeautiful, but they soon lose their good looks, owing to the hard work they have to do. They are at it from morning till night, carrying water, cooking, hoeing in the yam fields, bringing in fuel from the forest, while the men laze about in the sun, and breed flies. One thing, however; this incessant labour renders them very strong, and strength is a valued asset in a Tschokossi woman. A weak one stands a poor chance in the matrimonial market. "Amongst us, men choose their wives for strength, not for beauty," remarked one burly savage to me. I have heard somewhat similar sentiments expressed amongst our working classes in Europe. And after all, what is the philosophy of these savages regarding marriage but a primitive form of eugenics?

As for the men, they strongly resent the imputation of laziness. "We are fighters," remarked the old chief when I gently tackled him on the subject, "not workers. It is for the women to work, whilst we protect them against outside interference." "But," I said, "there is no fighting to be done now; the land is at peace." "Who knows?" was his somewhat cryptic reply.

If, however, these far northern tribes, the Tschokossi, the Gourma, and others, resent being called lazy, they regard as flattering the charges of treachery and cowardice that are brought against them. They look upon the shooting of a foe from behind with a poisoned arrow, not only as legitimate warfare, but as the very best and highest form of warfare. It is their business to stalk an enemy, to see and not be seen, to pounce upon him unawares; a proceeding which, after all, is recommended by all writers on strategy, and practised by all beasts of prey. It is a fact, too, that a certain kind of cowardice requires a certain kind of courage. The prowling savage who climbs the walls of a Tschokossi village at dead of night in order to take pot-shots at the sleeping inhabitants with his poisoned arrows, is not exactly a coward, however reprehensible his conduct may appear judged from a civilised standpoint. For having accomplished his object, he has to make good his retreat, with an even chance that by that time the whole village is in an uproar, and I can conceive of no less desirable place wherein to be trapped by a score or so of vengeful enemies, than the well-like space between the huts and the inclosing walls.

I had many talks with the old chief regarding these and other matters, and once he made some sort of an odd remark which caused me to laugh heartily. "Oh then," he said, looking mildly astonished, "you _can_ laugh." "Of course I can laugh," I answered. "Why not?" "Well," he replied, "I have never seen a white woman before, but I have always been told that they are unable to laugh."

Although the chief, and in a lesser degree his people, were fairly friendly with me, they continued up to the end to show themselves suspicious and distrustful of our boys, and this distrust showed itself in many curious, not to say inconvenient ways. For example, it was our custom while on trek to allow our personal staff, numbering about fifteen, three-halfpence a day extra subsistence money. With this they used, on arriving at a village, to club together, and engage a woman to buy their provisions and to cook for them; in fact, to board them during their stay there. But in Sumbu no woman could be got to undertake the job, nor would they even sell them provisions until they had exchanged their coined money for salt, the usual currency of the country. With this they were at length able to buy provisions, millet-meal, yams, &c. Then, however, a new difficulty presented itself. They had no one to cook for them, nor had they any cooking utensils of their own. So they came to me, and asked me to lend them one of our pots. Naturally, I declined; I am not over squeamish, but to eat after natives! Faugh! On the other hand, I could not stand by and see the poor fellows go hungry. So off I went to the village, and begged the chief to let me have the loan of a pot. After a lot of palaver he consented, and Schomburgk, at my request, allowed his gun-bearer to be struck off duty in the afternoons in order to cook for them. This arrangement worked fairly well, for natives eat only once a day, of an evening. Then they consume an enormous meal. One can actually see their stomach "swell wisibly," like the Fat Boy in _Pickwick_.

No sooner had this difficulty been settled, however, than another one arose. Owing to the boycott of the villagers, the boys could not even get the use of a hut to sleep in at night, and had to camp out in the open. They complained to me, and I told Schomburgk about it, but found him unsympathetic. "If the Sumbu people won't lend them a hut, they won't, and there's an end of it. I have no right to force them to. Besides, it is good to sleep out in Africa. I've slept out hundreds of nights when hunting elephants, and it never did me any harm, nor will it them. Tell them I said so." I did as I was told, and the boys had to sleep out for the rest of the time we remained in the neighbourhood. But they didn't like it one bit.

In fact, towards the end of our stay here, some of them began to get somewhat surly and discontented, not like their usual selves. One reason for this probably was that, on quitting Mangu, their women had all been left behind there. This had been done at their own wish, as they said they were afraid to take them up-country to where we were going. Nevertheless, they no doubt felt the separation keenly, for natives temporarily divorced from their womenkind are like ships without their rudders. They had all taken it for granted, by the way, that I too was to be left behind in Mangu, and seemed greatly surprised and anxious when they heard that I was going to accompany the caravan. Indeed, just as we were about to start, all our personal boys came to me in a body, and implored me not to go, saying that the Tschokossi of the north were dangerous, and that they feared for the safety of their "little white mother." I was greatly touched by their solicitude, but of course I was unable to accede to their request, even had I a mind to, which I had not. Later on I overheard Asmani, Schomburgk's personal servant, while discussing the journey with another boy, exclaim: "Well, I shall be glad when our little white mother is safe again on board the steamer."

Another source of dissatisfaction, was that there was a shortage of caravan food. For one thing, our European flour began to give out, and we ourselves were obliged to eat bread made half of millet-meal and half of flour. I didn't like it a bit. But for the Fulani, in fact, we should have been, if not exactly on short rations, at all events on restricted ones. These used to bring us, when they came with our daily allowance of milk, huge calabashes of buttermilk, which the boys used to purchase, and mix with their millet-meal, thereby obtaining a welcome addition to their diet.

Meanwhile their clothing, what they had of it, was going from bad to worse. Messa had to cut off the legs of his trousers above the knees, in order to patch the portion covering that part of his anatomy on which boys are birched at school. Alfred, the interpreter, was in an even worse fix, because he had no trouser-legs left to utilise after this fashion. He complained to me, saying that his appearance was not decent. I was bound to agree with him as to this, but pointed out to him that I could do nothing in the matter just then, as we had no spare clothing with the caravan. When we got back to Mangu, I told him, Schomburgk was going to rig out all our personal staff with new clothes; in the meantime I suggested to him that he should wear a "lavelap," which is a West African term for a whole piece of cloth wrapped round the body. "Oh dear no, little mother," he replied, in deeply shocked tones. "An interpreter cannot wear a 'lavelap,' he must at least have a pair of trousers."

Next day I noticed that Messa, who was always a bit of a dandy, had covered his bare legs, from the ankles to above the knees, with strips of white cloth dipped in washing-blue, and arranged like putties. I rallied him on his "improved" appearance, but he only smiled feebly and somewhat sadly, so I asked him what was the matter. Thereupon he confided to me that he was worried about his wife, who was lying ill at Mangu. This was the same young lady whom, it will be remembered, he had gone back to Kamina to fetch while we were on the road up from there to Sokode, and her illness, or at all events the undue prolongation of it, was largely his own fault.

She was always bright and bonny until we got to Paratau. Then, when we resumed our march, she seemed to have changed altogether. She was always tired, and appeared as if trying to elude our observation. Messa, too, got sad and sulky, so one day, after we had camped, I went over to their quarters to try and find out what was the matter. I found the girl sitting disconsolate outside their hut, crying, and nursing a frightfully swollen and ulcerated leg. I went and told Schomburgk, who examined it, and at once diagnosed it as a very bad and greatly neglected case of filaria, otherwise guinea-worm. These dangerous parasites burrow under the human skin, generally in the feet or legs, and the female lays eggs, giving rise to abscesses, and also causing grave functional disturbances. They are removed by very slowly twining them round a stick, and the natives assert, and apparently with some measure of truth, that if the worm is broken in the process, the death of the person affected will ensue. Messa had known all along, it appeared, what his wife was suffering from, but fearing to have her sent back, had tried to conceal it from us. Schomburgk gave the poor girl some mercurial ointment, and afterwards several of the parasites were removed in the manner described above, many of the natives being exceedingly skilful in this matter. Now, it appeared, he was anxious, fearing a relapse. As a matter of fact, on our return to Mangu, we found the patient practically convalescent.