TWO DIANAS IN SOMALILAND 25 



handsome fellow, not very dark, about the Arab colour, 

 with a mop of dark hair turning slightly grey. His 

 features were of the Arab type, and I should say a 

 strong Arab strain ran in his family, stronger even than 

 in most Somali tribes. I think the Arab tinge exists 

 more or less in every one of them. Anyhow, they are 

 not of negritic descent. 



Our man used the Somali " Nabad " as a salutation, 

 instead of the " Salaam aleikum " of the Arabs. The 

 last is the most generally used. We heard it almost 

 invariably in the Ogaden and Marehan countries. 

 Clarence had donned resplendent garb in which to give 

 us greeting, and discarding the ordinary everyday 

 white tobe had dressed himself in the khaili, a tobe 

 dyed in shades of the tricolour, fringed with orange. 

 We never saw him again tricked out like this ; evidently 

 the get-up must have been borrowed for the occasion. 

 He wore a tusba, or prayer chaplet, round his neck, 

 and the beads were made from some wood that had a 

 pleasant aroma. A business-like dagger was at the 

 waist ; Peace and War were united. 



I noticed what long tapering fingers the Somali had, 

 and quite aristocratic hands, though so brown. He 

 had a very graceful way of standing too. In fact all 

 his movements were lithe and lissome, telling us he 

 was a jungle man. I liked him the instant I set eyes 

 on him, and we were friends from the day we met to 

 the day we parted. Had we been unable to secure his 

 services I do not know where we should have ended, 

 or what the trip might have cost. Everyone in Berbera 

 seemed bent on making us pay for things twice over, 



