LEARNING. — FOOD. 
561 
parts of Sudan, it consists principally of* dukhn or pen- 
nisetum typhoideum ; but they have also some wheat and 
rice. The people of Waday have a plentiful supply of 
meat, and are tolerably well provided with milk and 
butter, and are therefore not obliged to have recourse 
every day to that insipid broth made of dried and powdered 
fish, formed into a sort of loaf, and in this form called 
" mendichek," the dried fish, preserved in its natural form, 
being called cc fertene." On the contrary, they have a tole- 
rably good variety of dishes, of which I shall give a short 
list, without, however, being able to explain the exact pre- 
paration of each. But first I must observe, that the people 
of Waday do not make any use of the funduk or karru, the 
large wooden mortar so exclusively used over other parts of 
Negroland, but grind their dukhn on stones, their country 
being rather of a stony character, while in many parts of 
Bornu and Bagirmi not a single stone is seen. As far as the 
dishes are prepared of dukhn, the following are the principal 
ones : first the damirge, the common daily dish ; then 
masaffa, a very favourite dish in Waday ; reshefa, another dish 
of dukhn, prepared with milk ; takarin, prepared with the 
fat of oxen, instead of milk; kissere, denasi, amkoshu, 
suri, kokor, ajine amrafa, rototo, and subay ; another dish 
made of sesamum and called amkeleno. Then their various 
sweetmeats, as the killikab, prepared with corn and honey ; 
the matabba, made of rice and honey ; the kak, made of corn, 
or rice, with butter, honey, and dates; the ajine zerka; 
and, finally, the faworo, made of dates boiled in milk and 
then left to cool. Of the dishes of meat, the weka, and the 
shaham el kebel are the most celebrated. As for drinking, 
it is well known that almost all the people of Waday indulge 
in an intoxicating beverage called merisa by the Arabs, of 
which there are three species, — the bilbil or red, the akebesh 
or white, and the "hal." 
I cannot conclude this account of Waday without stating 
that the whole of it was drawn up in Bagirmi in the year 
VOL. III. 0 O 
