KAVIRONDO 69 



The most important manufacture in Kavirondo is the smelt- 

 ing of iron ore and the fashioning of hoes. The iUustration 

 shows a native blacksmith's extremely simple paraphernalia. In 

 a large basket he has charcoal, and in a smaller basket the red 

 iron ore broken into very tiny pieces. His hammer is simply 

 a heavy stone, the tongs a green twig split half way down. 

 The bellows is double-muzzled and covered with two goat- 

 skins which have each a long stick attached. The man who 

 works the bellows stands, and holding these two sticks, he 

 works them up and down. The two hands by thus working 

 alternately produce a continuous draught. The bellows is of 

 wood, and the draught is driven into a roughly fashioned clay 

 pipe, and thus conveyed to the fire. The clay pipe is in 

 sections, roughly held together with wet clay. The construc- 

 tion of the bellows is somewhat peculiar. It is carved out of a 

 solid block of wood, and consists of two separate basin-shaped 

 depressions, each having its own passage tunnelled to the other 

 end of the block. The piece of goatskin which covers each 

 basin must be sufttciently large to be pulled up and pushed 

 down ; this movement draws in and expels the air. Wooden 

 shields are old-fashioned and so heavy that the man who carries 

 one has not much chance of using a spear or any other offensive 

 weapon, his whole strength being required to support the shield. 

 Several of the war-helmets I saw, were really wicker-baskets, 

 kept on the head by a leather strap which passes under the 

 chin. They are often ornamented with circles, painted on with 

 red and white clay. 



Our leader kept a sharp look-out that the captured women 

 and children were not carried off as slaves, but were handed 

 over to his care. Amongst primitive tribes, war is simply a 

 repetition of what one reads of in the Old Testament — every 

 adult male is put to death, the women and children are captured 

 and become slaves. Native women are often very callous, and 

 readily accept as husband the murderer of their male relatives. 

 Centuries of bloodshed, indiscriminate slaughter, and slave- 

 raiding amongst themselves, have gradually blunted nobler 

 feelings, and reduced these human beings to the level of 

 beasts. The children, having lost their father, and being sepa- 

 rated probably also from their mother, soon forget their 

 origin, and grow up as the children of the tribe into which they 

 have been adopted. No doubt a good many of the captured 



