MARKET-LIFE. 113 



to the south have cattle exposed for sale, and the tall Wakidi 

 warriors, with their towering hair and iron gorgets, look on at the 

 busy scene with indifference. They do not need dress materials, 

 and what they want of iron, copper, glass beads, &c, Kabrega 

 gives them in abundance, in return for the ivory they bring 

 him, it being, no doubt, to his interest to win the favour of these 

 paying customers and secure them for himself. Among the 

 thronging people, crowds of neighbouring villagers push their 

 way and try to find a market for their bananas, sweet potatoes, 

 beans, gourds, Colocasia, and flour ; fishermen from the Albert 

 Lake with (so-called) fresh and dried fish, women with enor- 

 mous gourd-jugs full of foaming beer, male and female beggars, 

 prostitutes, naked children, all scream and shout, and cattle, 

 goats, sheep, and dogs add to the ever-changing confusion. 

 Groups of merry people are assembled around full beer-pots 

 making music, the venal beauties of the country lending hearty 

 assistance. Those who have finished their business and are pre- 

 paring to go, generally turn into one of the adjacent smithies, 

 which here, as in all Negro countries, are the places of resort 

 for gossip, and among a group of idlers they are sure to hear the 

 latest town and court news to take back to their distant homes. 

 Thus the busy tumult continues till about four o'clock in the 

 afternoon, when the people gradually disperse, and the noise of 

 those that buy and sell is replaced by the barking of dogs and 

 the angry cry of vultures as they fight over their meal, until 

 they too disappear at dusk, and bats and night-jars (macro- 

 dipterix) commence their ghostly flight in the pale moonlight. 

 Before the Arabs found their way to Uganda and Unyoro — 

 leaving out of account a very old Arab settlement in Karagwa 

 — the trade of these countries must have been limited to 

 the barter of articles absolutely necessary to life. The value 

 of the wares offered for sale must naturally, therefore, have 

 depended on the pleasure of the seller and the greater or 

 less need of the buyer, and his means. Money, or a sub- 

 stitute for it, certainly did not exist. But from the moment 

 the first Arabs, Musa Mzuri and Ahmed-ibn-Ibrahim (who 

 is still living in Werahanje), entered Uganda at the invitation 

 of Mt^sa's father, Suna, the state of things was changed. The 

 opening up of the road to Zanzibar, a journey at that time of 



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