Chap. XXXIV. SIMPLICITY OF MANNERS. 
429 
girls also, who from the first had cast a kindly eye 
upon me, came jumping up to me, accompanied by 
an elder married sister. One of these girls was 
about fifteen, the other about eight or nine years of 
age. They were decently dressed as Mohammedans, 
in shirts covering the bosom, while the pagans, 
although they had dressed for the occasion, wore 
nothing but a narrow strip of leather passed between 
the legs, and fastened round the loins, with a large 
leaf attached to it from behind ; the women were, 
besides, ornamented with the " kadama," which is the 
same as the segheum of the Margin, and worn in 
the same way, stuck through the under-lip, but a 
little larger. Their prevailing complexion was a 
yellowish red, like that of the Margin, with whom, 
a few centuries ago, they evidently formed one na- 
tion. Their worship, also, is nearly the same. 
At length I left my elevated situation, and with a 
good deal of trouble succeeded in getting down again ; 
but the tranquillity which I had before enjoyed was 
now gone, and not a moment was I left alone. All 
these poor creatures wanted to have my blessing; 
and there was particularly an old blacksmith, who, 
although he had become a proselyte to Islam, pestered 
me extremely with his entreaties to benefit him by 
word and prayer. They went so far as to do me the 
honour, which I of course declined, of identifying me 
with their god " fete," who, they thought, might have 
come to spend a day with them, to make them forget 
their oppression and misfortunes. The pagans, how- 
