Chap. XXIII. SCARCITY OF CLOTHING. 311 



ling. An old woman, standing by our camp, continued for 

 hours to belabour a young man with her tongue. Irritated at 

 last, he uttered some words of impatience, when another man 

 sprang at him, exclaiming, " How dare you curse my 'mama'?" 

 They caught each other, and a sort of wrestling-match ensued, 

 which ended by one falling under the other. This trifling 

 incident was of interest to me, for during the whole period of 

 my residence in the Eechuana country I never saw unarmed 

 men strike each other. Their disputes are usually conducted 

 with great volubility and noisy swearing, but generally 

 terminate by both parties bursting into a laugh. 



Throughout this region the women are almost entirely 

 naked, their gowns being a patch of cloth frightfully narrow, 

 with no flounces; and nothing could exceed the eagerness 

 with which they offered to purchase strips of calico of an 

 inferior description. They were delighted at getting pieces 

 about two feet long in exchange for a fowl and a basket of 

 upwards of 20 lbs. of meal. Many of the women, with true 

 maternal feelings, held up their little naked babies, entreating 

 us to sell only a little rag for them. The fire, they say, is 

 their only clothing by night, and the little ones derive heat 

 by clinging closely to their parents. Instead of a skin or cloth 

 to carry their babies in, the women plait a belt, about four 

 inches broad, of the inner bark of a tree, and this, hung like a 

 soldier's belt, enables them to support the child by placing it 

 on their side in a sitting position. 



On the evening of the 2nd of June we reached the village 

 of Kawawa, consisting of forty or fifty huts, in the midst of a 

 forest. Drums were beating over the body of a man who had 

 died the preceding day, and some women were making a 

 clamorous wail at the door of his hut, and addressing the 

 deceased as if alive. A person fantastically dressed with a 

 great number of feathers, who was intended to represent one of 

 the Barimo, left the people at the dance, and went away into 

 the deep forest in the morning, to return again to the obsequies 

 in the evening. 



In the mornir.g Kawawa visited us, and we spent nearly the 

 whole day in conversation with him and his people. V.hen 

 we visited him in return we found him in his largo court- 

 house, which, though of a beehive shape, was remarkably well 



