296 THE LAKE REGIONS OF CENTRAL AFRICA. 



or drinking-cup, which also serves as a travelling can- 

 teen, is made generally by the women, of a kind of grass 

 called m&vu, or of wild palm-leaf : the split stalks are 

 neatly twisted into a fine cord, which is rolled up, be- 

 ginning from the bottom, in concentric circles, each 

 joined to its neighbour by a binding of the same mate- 

 rial : it is sometimes stained and ornamented with red 

 and black dyes. The shape when finished is a trun- 

 cated cone, somewhat like a Turk's fez ; it measures 

 about six inches in diameter by five in depth, and 

 those of average size may contain a quart. This cup 

 passes around without delay or heel-taps, and the 

 topers stop occasionally to talk, laugh, and snuff, to 

 chew tobacco, and to smoke bhang. The scene of 

 sensuality lasts for three or four hours — in fact, till 

 the pombe prepared for the occasion is exhausted, — 

 when the carousers, with red eyes, distorted features, 

 and the thickest of voices, stagger home to doze through 

 the day. Perhaps in no European country are so 

 many drunken men seen abroad as in East Africa. 

 Women also frequently appear intoxicated ; they have, 

 however, private " pombe," and do not drink with the 

 men. 



The East African, who can seldom afford to gratify 

 his longing for meat by slaughtering a cow or a goat, 

 looks eagerly forward to the end of the rains, when the 

 grass is in a fit condition for firing ; then, armed with 

 bows and arrows, and with rungu or knobkerries, the 

 villagers have a battue of small antelopes, hares, and 

 birds, During the hot season also, when the waters 

 dry up, they watch by night at the tanks and pools, 

 and they thus secure the larger kinds of game. Ele- 

 phants especially are often found dead of drought during 

 the hot season ; they are driven from the springs 



