80 FROM THE NIGER TO THE NILE 



women carry their loads on their heads. The natives from 

 the north bank swim across the river, placing their things 

 in large calabashes which they push in front of them, and the 

 cattle that are for sale swim after. By noon all have come in 

 and the scene is at its liveliest, the people often numbering 

 as many as 1500. A perfect babel of talk goes on. The 

 sellers sit jammed together in circles, with their wares spread 

 out in front of them. All have come armed for fear of the 

 Tubus, and now each little group stick their spears point 

 upwards in the ground where they sit, and the market 

 assumes the aspect of a forest of spears. 



When wares are not bartered, dollars are freely circulated. 

 Ponies fetch £2 to £3 ; oxen £1 lOs. to £3 ; donkeys 15s. 

 to £1 ; sheep Is. 6d. to 3s. Goats go at Is., and 200 pounds of 

 millet corn can be bought for 4s. Besides all these things there 

 are masses of dried fish which the Mobburs buy from the 

 Budumas and bring to the market. There are also onions, 

 salt, potash, baskets, pots, leather-work, cloth and raw 

 cotton, and alkama, the wheat of Bornu. Towards three 

 o'clock the market begins to break up, and then it is that 

 many outrages are committed by Tubus and the lawless of 

 the Mobburs on the people going home. Many, however, 

 who have come from long distances prefer to stop the night 

 near the market, returning home the next day. 



The day that Jose was in the market trying to hire 

 oxen, he witnessed the remarkable sight of a Tubu raid. 

 He was sitting under a tree having his " chop " just outside 

 the thick of the crowd, when suddenly the cry of " Tubu, 

 Tubu " was raised. In an instant the market was in an 

 uproar and panic seized the people, who fled in all directions. 



