198 FROM THE NIGER TO THE NILE 



determined by the trade-routes, and they worked from Egypt 

 along the coastways to TripoH, and then hearing of the rich 

 land in the south, came down the roads of the caravans 

 through the Sahara to trade and eventually to form industrial 

 settlements. Another proof of their Eastern origin appears 

 in their name for the giraffe, an animal which they would 

 have seen for the first time in Nigeria, and which they have 

 called Rakume dage, or the camel of the bush, as their 

 familiar camel was the nearest animal they could liken it to. 



At Nassarawa the two boys, whom I had taken on 

 from the patrol on the Lokoja boat, deserted. They were 

 evidently tired of steady marching without the compensation 

 of occasional looting, and disappeared without waiting for 

 the pay that was due to them. But first they carefully laid 

 all the things that had been entrusted to their charge in 

 a prominent place in my house, for fear, in the event of 

 the things getting stolen, they might be suspected and 

 pursued ; such a belief have they in the consequential nature 

 of the white man's justice. 



Mamadu, the king of Nassarawa, received me well with 

 a generous " dash " of the customary fowls and eggs and 

 calabashes of milk. Also, he placed a good house at my 

 disposal and showed that he had a knowledge of white men, 

 by sending up by his women great jars of water imme- 

 diately upon our arrival. So I returned his hospitality by 

 giving him a performance on the gramophone, which was 

 received with awe and stony wonder, till a rollicking laughing 

 song set the mouths of king and courtiers agape and grinning, 

 and echoing ripples ran round the circle to break, as the fellow 

 in the machine got away with the chorus, into shouts and 



