rs and
spotty designs. This is drawn tight just above the breasts, leaving the
shoulders and arms bare. Their hair is divided into perhaps a dozen
parts running lengthwise of the head from the forehead to the nape of
the neck, after the manner of the stripes on a watermelon. Each part
then ends in a tiny twisted pigtail not over an inch long. The lobes of
their ears have been stretched until they hold thick round disks about
three inches in diameter, ornamented by concentric circles of different
colours, with a red bull's eye for a centre. The outer edges of the ears
are then further decorated with gold clasps set closely together. Many
bracelets, necklaces, and armlets complete the get-up. They are big
women, with soft velvety skins and a proud and haughty carriage--the
counterparts of the men in the white robes and caps.

By the way, it may be a good place here to remark that these garments,
and the patterned squares of cloth worn by the women, are invariably
most spotlessly clean.

These, we learned, were the Swahilis, the ruling class, the descendants
of the slave traders. Beside them are all sorts and conditions. Your
true savage pleased his own fancy as to dress and personal adornment.
The bushmen generally shaved the edges of their wool to leave a nice
close-fitting natural skull cap, wore a single blanket draped from one
shoulder, and carried a war club. The ear lobe seemed always to be
stretched; sometimes sufficiently to have carried a pint bottle. Indeed,
white marmalade jars seemed to be very popular wear. One ingenious
person had acquired a dozen of the sort of safety pins used to fasten
curtains to their rings. These he had snapped into the lobes, six on a
side.

We explored for some time. One of the Swahilis attached himself to us so
unobtrusively that before we knew it we had accepted him as guide. In
that capacity he realized an ideal, for he never addressed a word to us,
nor did he even stay in sight. We wandered along at our sweet will,
dawdling as slowly as we pleased. The guide had apparently quite
disappeared. Look where we would we could in no manner discover him. At
the next corner we would pause, undecided as to what to do; there, in
the middle distance, would stand our friend, smiling. When he was sure
we had seen him, and were about to take the turn properly, he would
disappear again. Convoyed in this pleasant fashion we wound and twisted
up and down and round and about through the most app