198 CHIEFS & CITIES OF CENTRAL AFRICA 



hat, a brass throwing-weapon, and a bag containing 

 many MSS. hung upon the wall, and amongst them 

 were two cotton sunshades that could never have 

 cost more than 2s. 6d. in the first freshness of their 

 youth at Berlin. The Jeggara cast his eyes from 

 one object to another, in apparent triumph at being 

 possessor of such riches ; but the German sergeant 

 had followed us, and the display may have been meant 

 to produce a different impression upon him. After 

 half an hour the comedy palled upon us, and we 

 suggested that he had other wives. He took us at 

 once to a large yard, full of mud and dirt, where 

 turkeys wandered about, and here he summoned some 

 60 or 70 of his 200 wives. A few armfuls of straw 

 were brought for them to sit upon, and they came, in 

 twos and threes, humbly, with bent bodies and averted 

 eyes, crouching against the farther wall. The Jeggara 

 himself sat a few yards off and watched us apathetic- 

 ally, until, to gratify feminine curiosity, I unrolled my 

 hair and let it down for them to see. He then sprang 

 to his feet and came forward to examine it, while the 

 ladies emitted little gasps of breathless excitement. 



In the course of our visit the Jeggara granted our 

 request that we might have the use of the two canoes 

 that had brought us across the river to take us down 

 the Shari. We did not think it wise to tell him then 

 of our wish to take them right across Lake Chad, for no 

 native canoe, other than their own, had ever been 

 allowed by the Buduma to venture on its waters ; and, 

 did there seem real cause for fear when we reached the 

 river's mouth, we should have been obliged to wait our- 

 selves until we could obtain Buduma canoes. 



We were the more glad to have his consent to this 



