ARABIC DRESS AND CUSTOMS 309 



turn, and also those of the Arabs. The houses are chiefly 

 built of coral rock, plastered with lime, and roofed with fan- 

 palm leaves. The door and window openings are made with 

 flat-pointed and zigzagged arches ; and when the rooms are 

 wide, a line of piers and arches runs down its length, giving a 

 cool depth of shade quite Eastern in its effect. The doorways 

 have elaborately carved lintels and posts ; these are all done at 

 Bombay and brought here ready for fitting. There is a little 

 stone carving also here and there, and Arabic sentences are 

 carved over the doors in some cases. The men are in Indian 

 dress, and the women with nose-jewels, silver armlets and 

 anklets, and the long muslin robe thrown over the head and 

 wound round the body. 



Arabic dress and customs were not less prominent in 

 Mojanga. Close to our lodging was a small mosque, and from 

 the flat roof we could hear the muezzin calling the faithful to 

 prayers five times a day in a long sonorous musical cry before 

 sunrise, in the forenoon, at noon, at three o'clock, and at 

 sunset, and could see his form silhouetted against the sky, 

 making a number of prostrations when the call was finished. 

 Our stay here was in the month Ramazan, the great fasting- 

 time of the Mohammedans, when they eat and drink nothing 

 all day, at least the strictly orthodox do not. They make up 

 for it, however, at night ; and feasting and jollity seemed to be 

 the general employment. Our house adjoining the main street, 

 it was extremely noisy until long after midnight. There is no 

 doubt that the Arabs, and also the Indians, have been settled 

 at Mojanga, as well as at other places on the north-west coast, 

 for centuries. As we have seen in Chapter XII., there was an 

 Arab colony at some remote period on the south-east coast, but 

 this was gradually absorbed and lost in the native population 

 and no longer maintains a separate existence. The north- 

 western colony, however, being in constant communication 

 with Suahili land and the Arab element there, has maintained 

 its individuality, and kept its dress, customs, language, and 

 religion quite distinct from the Malagasy around it. 



Amongst the magnificent mango -trees in the park are many 

 specimens of the baobab-tree (Adansonia madagascariensis) ; 

 one of these must be from seventy to eighty feet in girth. The 

 trunks of these trees are of enormous size compared with the 



