GOING TO MARKET 53 



comes a man in a blue and white " toga " cloth, which 

 is draped to leave black legs, arms and right shoulder 

 bare and free; he is heading cocoa beans in a white 

 cotton bag. Follows a youth bare to the waist and 

 up to the knees, but clad about the loins with an 

 indigo and cinnamon hued cloth of Oriental design, 

 worn short-petticoat fashion; his headload of cocoa 

 beans is in a blue and white wrapper. Close behind 

 comes a striking study in black and white; a woman 

 whose black skin shines like ebony against her dull 

 black draperies is balancing a white cotton load on her 

 woolly head. Striding with stately gait alongside this 

 woman is a tiny pickin, who helps himself along with 

 a pilgrim's staff; he is wearing a ragged nightshirt 

 and a scarlet and gold smoking cap, and by the help 

 of a blue and white head-pad he balances a huge 

 brass bowl piled up with plantains. His near neigh- 

 bouring, childish companions in the procession include 

 a little girl dressed in a string of beads, who is heading 

 a load of cocoa to market, and a small boy in bathing 

 drawers, who is almost lost to view under the bundle 

 of wood stacked up on his head. 



Similar processions to that in which we are joining 

 are now wending their way to Nsawam, Mangoase and 

 Tafo, and to numerous sub- stations which are feeders 

 for the main buying stations in the Accra district. 

 Similar activities, too, are in progress in the Winnebah 

 cocoa district and in the cocoa-growing region of 

 Ashanti. And throughout the season, similar busy 

 scenes, and others at which we are just going to have 

 a peep, are matters of daily occurrence. 



Cocoa beans in the Gold Coast and Ashanti are all 

 grown and prepared for market by natives. The 

 buyers, however, are natives and Europeans. 



