340 RUMBEK. 



but living upon the produce of the chase, or at times working 

 as smiths amongst the tribes just mentioned, whose villages 

 and huts they are otherwise not allowed to enter. If their 

 position is remarkable, their habits appear to be more so. 

 Scorpions and snakes living in dry places are larger and more 

 poisonous than those found in moist depressions, with the 

 single exception of the python. It is said that in the dis- 

 tricts frequented by the Derr there exist exceedingly poison- 

 ous snakes of a reddish-brown colour, and about three feet 

 in length, but the people know how to catch them. Having 

 secured them by stratagem, they enclose a pool of water by 

 a strong thorn fence, so arranged that the game coming to 

 drink is obliged to pass through a narrow lane. The snakes, 

 having had a hole bored through their tails, are fastened at 

 the spot where the lane opens upon the water, and they not 

 unnaturally bite the animals which attempt to pass. In this 

 way two and three antelopes are caught in a day, the flesh 

 being used as food by the hunters, and the skins employed 

 to purchase wives. 



The Agar are very superstitious. They not only believe in 

 all sorts of evil spirits dwelling in the forest — good spirits are 

 never believed in by a Negro — but they also look upon certain 

 animals, such as the owl, the Galago, and especially the jackal, 

 as harbingers of ill, who have to be carefully observed. One of 

 the good qualities of the Agar, apart from their politeness and 

 abstention from begging, is their cleanliness, which not only 

 extends to their persons and food, but also to their villages ; 

 for, in contradistinction to other Negro villages, all the lanes 

 between their huts are clean and free from odours. 



