750 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



in the field, take care of the other children, and smoke. All this 

 mnst be done early, for it will not be many years before a pur- 

 chaser will come for her ; and at ten or twelve years of age she 

 will probably be called npon to follow a stranger. Notwithstand- 

 ing the early marriages, the number of children seldom exceeds 

 three, and the woman is a matron at twenty. When she has 

 passed her bloom she is relegated to the capacity of a servant, and 

 her husband gets another, younger wife. Thus men of means 

 often take one or two new women every year. The women and 

 their children live in separate houses, which are not shared by 

 the husband. He lives, too, in a house of his own, in the midst 

 of the women's houses, which are sometimes quite numerous. 

 King Bell has a hundred and twenty wives. The intercourse be- 

 tween mother and child is very different from what it is with us, 

 and the Cameroons mother is more sparing in her caresses than 

 her white sisters. Kissing has no place among them, but they 

 have their own peculiar ways of fondling and petting, which per- 

 haps represent as much affection as the more demonstrative pro- 

 ceedings of Europeans. 



So long as they are young and handsome the Cameroons 

 women pay great attention to their toilet. The petticoat, which 

 reaches down from the hips to the ankles, must be thoroughly 

 smooth and clean, and the apron, which is worn under it, is as 

 spotless as the under-clothing of a European lady. Their hair is 

 woven by professional hair-dressers into braids of various shapes, 

 without grease and usually without ornaments, although a woman 

 is occasionally found who wears a string of beads around her 

 head. The dressing usually lasts for a week, and is bound up at 

 night in a cloth for protection. It is also a part of the hair- 

 dresser's business, which is carried on in the street, to pull out 

 the lady's eyelashes. A string of pearls or some other ornament 

 of European origin is worn around the neck. The shoulders, 

 breast, and belly are covered with ornamental tattooing in red 

 and blue, apparently centering at the navel. Elaborate ruffles of 

 ivory or metallic rings are worn upon the wrists and ankles. 



The principal musical instrument is the drum, or climbi, which 

 is made from a hollowed log. It has a slot along the direction of 

 its length, which is unevenly divided by a bridge left across it, on 

 which the drumstick is beat to produce different tones. The 

 music is at first monotonous enough to the ear, and it is hard to 

 realize that the instrument is available as a telegraph. Yet this 

 is its principal use. The Cameroons man drums out every event 

 that appears worth communicating. The next man takes it up 

 and drums it on, and in this way news is spread speedily from one 

 village to another. A regular drum-language has been worked 

 out, which the Cameroons man can imitate with his mouth or beat 



