Chap. V. 



NATIVE MANUFACTURES. 



11; 



Iron ore is dug out of the hills, and its manufacture is 

 the staple trade of the southern highlands. Each village has 

 its snielting-house, its charcoal-burners, and blacksmiths. 

 They make good axes, spears, needles, arrow-heads, brace- 

 lets and anklets, which, considering the entire absence of 

 machinery, are sold at surprisingly low rates ; a hoe over two 

 pounds in weight is exchanged for calico of about the value of 



Blacksmith's Forge and Bellows of Goatskin. , 



fourpence. In villages near Lake Shirwa and elsewhere, the 

 inhabitants enter pretty largely into the manufacture of 

 crockery, or pottery, making by hand all sorts of cooking, 

 water, and grain pots, which they ornament with plumbago 

 found in the hills. Some find employment in weaving neat 

 baskets from split bamboos, and others collect the fibre of the 

 buaze, which grows abundantly on the hills, and make it into 

 fish-nets. These they either use themselves, or exchange 

 with the fishermen on the river or lakes for dried fish and 

 salt. A great deal of native trade is carried on between 

 the villages, by means of barter in tobacco, salt, dried fish, 



