12 THROUGH UNKNOWN AFRICAN COUNTRIES. 
ence with them, I found that when two of them fight with 
each other they will throw away rifles or spears, or any 
other weapon, before getting to close quarters, so that 
little damage can be done to either of them. They are 
very careful to be on the safe side; although, when they 
must fight, they are steady, and show considerable moral 
courage. 
The Somalis are not the noble warriors in their native 
land that reports have made them out, for in their constant 
fights against their neighbors the attacking party invariably 
see to it that they have the greatest odds in their favor. 
A fight in which hundreds of men may take part rarely 
terminates in more than four or five deaths. The men 
attend to the camels and flocks of sheep and goats, but 
they let the women do all the hard part of the work in 
their villages. The women are regarded merely as goods 
and chattels. In a conversation with one of my boys he 
told me that he only owned five camels, but that he had 
a sister from whom he expected to get much money when 
he sold her in marriage. The women are very carefully 
guarded; in consequence of which they have no sense of 
morality of their own, taking every opportunity in their 
power to flirt. 
Sir Richard Burton says, “As a general rule, Somali 
women prefer amorettes with strangers, following the well- 
known Arab proverb, ‘The newcomer filleth the eye.’ ” 
The first thing the native bridegroom does on marry- 
ing her is to give the Somali maiden a thoroughly good 
thrashing, so that she may never be “cheeky,” as one of 
my boys put it. The Somali women can scarcely be called 
handsome, except for their large, expressive brown eyes, 
and their beautiful white teeth, which, like all natives of 
Africa, they are continually scrubbing. Their tooth-brush 
is made of a twig of a tree called the Athei, which they 
