THE STRANGE VILLAGE OF KIYA BE 389 



billed duck. One thing is sure ; they look much better 

 with the disks in place than without them, for when 

 the saucers are removed and the distorted face exposed 

 to view, then the real savagery of the practice is 

 fully apparent. 



Using Ah as an interpreter, I found that the neigh- 

 boring tribes who scarred their faces did so in early 

 childhood when they were taken through the rites of 

 devil worship. With them it was a rehgion and had 

 not been brought about by any necessity, but the Sara 

 Kyabe commenced the practice of inserting disks in 

 the hps of their women as part of a plan to save the 

 tribe from extermination. Now that the need has 

 passed, they continue tliis disfigurement because it 

 has become an old-estabhshed custom, and is now 

 considered a mark of prestige. No woman can hope 

 to attain any prominence unless she sports a pair of 

 saucer-hps, and the larger her adornments, the liigher 

 her social standing. It is a case where beauty much 

 adorned is beauty adorned the least, for without these 

 disks the Sara Kyabe are the finest looking black 

 women in their part of Africa, and behind this fact 

 lies the reason for all the woes of the clan. In the days 

 of slave raiding, when Arab bands swept out of the 

 desert in their quest for "black ivory," they never 

 failed to call upon the Sara Kyabe, because, on account 

 of their exceptional beauty, these women brought the 

 highest prices on the slave markets. The product 

 eventually became so scarce that even the girl babies 

 were taken to be brought up by the Arab women 

 until old enough to sell. In the raids upon their 

 villages, many of the men were slain, so between this 

 killing of the defenders and the steahng of women, 



