46 
TRAVELS IN AFRICA. Chap. XXIII. 
left arm, while I counted not more than four or five 
muskets. Their dress was picturesque, and not too 
flowing for warlike purposes, the large shirt, or shirts 
(for they generally wear two), being fastened round 
the breast with an Egyptian shawl with a red border ; 
and even those who were dressed in a bernus had 
it wound round their breast. Most of them wore 
black " rawani," or shawls, round their faces, a 
custom which the Fellani of Hausa have adopted 
from the Tawarek merely on account of its looking 
warlike ; for they have no superstitious reason for 
covering the mouth. The harness of the horses was 
all of Hausa manufacture, the saddles very different 
from those of the Tawarek (which seem to be iden- 
tical with the old Arab saddles). The stirrups formed 
a very peculiar kind of medium between the large 
unwieldy stirrups of the modern Arab and the small 
ones of the Tawarek and Europeans, the sole of the 
stirrup being long, but turned down at both ends, 
while it is so narrow that the rider can only thrust 
the naked foot into it. I could not under- 
stand the principle upon which this kind of 
stirrup is made. It appeared to me a most 
absurd specimen of workmanship. 
The Fellani in Katsena have good reason to be 
on their guard against the Kel-owi, who, in an un- 
derhand way, are always assisting the independent 
Hausa states of Gober and Maradi in their struggle, 
and might some day easily make common cause with 
them to drive out these arrogant intruders from the 
