232 



THE PEOPLE. 



times they amuse themselves with running down 

 the little Saltiana antelopes, and with throwing 

 sticks at the guinea-fowls, which they have not 

 yet learned to domesticate. To the goodwife's 

 share falls the work of cleansing the little corral, 

 of fetching wood and water, of pounding maize 

 in a large tin mortar, of halving plantain-hread, of 

 cooking generally, and of carrying as well as of 

 bearing the bahy : it is evident that here, as 

 among the Mormons, division of labour is called 

 for, and it is readily supplied, without fear of 

 arrest, by polygamy and concubinage. Meat is 

 considered a luxury ; the cattle want the enlarged 

 udder, that unerring sign of bovine civilization, 

 and an English cow will produce as much fluid as 

 half-a-dozen Africans. The deficiency of milk in 

 pastoral lands often excites the traveller's wonder : 

 at times, after the herds have calved, he drinks it 

 gratis by pailsf ul ; during the rest of the year he 

 cannot buy a drop even for medicine. Most 

 tribes, moreover, have some uncomfortable super- 

 stitions about it — one will not draw it before night- 

 fall, another will not tamely stand by and see it 

 heated. Moreover, no pastoral people that I have 

 ever seen drink it fresh : they prefer to sour it 

 artificially, instead of trusting to their gastric 

 juices; and they are right. It is like the Cuisinier or 



