2o6 THE GAME OF BRITISH EAST AFRICA. 



you should know the exact articles required for barter, as native tastes differ 

 exceedingly among different tribes, or even sections of tribes. White calico and 

 brass wire are always safe things to take, but are none the less awkward things to 

 barter in exchange for food, for the local natives turn up in a long file, each man 

 with, perhaps, a cupful of flour, for which he expects remuneration, and to give out 

 a piece of calico or wire big enough to be used by each individual is, of course, 

 absurd. Beads and salt are useful things, as a small string of the former or a 

 spoonful or two of the latter can be given to each man. However, for both these 

 articles you must be certain of the market, as there may be a local salt manufactory, 

 when your packages will be found useless ; and then beads differ from time to time 

 and in different localities. As a rule there is only one particular sort of bead that is 

 acceptable, whereas any of a hundred other kinds will not be looked at. So unless 

 you are certain of the particular bead required, these are things better left alone, or 

 you will find yourself saddled with loads of perfectly useless ware. Tribes differ so 

 materially in customs, ornaments, and in their ways of regarding the white man, that 

 unless you have visited the spot before, or have first-hand and recent information, it 

 IS impossible to tell what may be required. 



Along the banks of the Upper Nile In certain parts, the most valuable things it 

 is possible to possess are empty plain glass bottles, as the natives break them up and 

 chip lip-ornaments from them. I have been offered two and even three chickens for 

 a Worcester sauce bottle, and an empty jam tin fetched another. Inland, bottles 

 and tins are perfectly useless. Most savages are very independent, and unless you 

 can find something they are very anxious to possess, then food will be almost 

 impossible to obtain. 



Some natives seem to have the greatest mistrust of the white man, and can 

 never be persuaded to do anything for him. Directly they are asked to bring food 

 or to produce a guide they all disappear into the bush. Other tribes that might 

 be expected to be much wilder often show the greatest confidence in the white 

 man from the beginning, or, rather, directly they find that he has not come to 

 kill or rob them. 



Every now and then a native will ask for medicine, but it is not a very usual 

 occurrence, and so I generally take only sufficient for myself and porters. The 

 natives of one tribe, whose confidence I was anxious to win so as to simplify the 

 food question, used to flock in for medicine, and some used to be carried in from 

 miles away to have enormous sores, the size of saucers, dressed. If I had been 

 aware beforehand that this might take place, I would have taken on trek large bottles 

 of iodoform, salts, and other simple remedies. 



