CHAPTER XVI. 
TRANSACTIONS AND OCCURRENCES DURING THE FIRST RESIDENCE AT 
LITAKUN. 
July 20th. While I was employed this morning in making a drawing 
of the mootsi, or public enclosure, in which my waggons were 
stationed, the Chief and his party remained sitting in their usual place 
near the hut, passing their time in desultory conversation, and occa- 
sionally in shaping handles for their corn-hoes, a kind of mattock, used 
by the women in digging or breaking up the land preparatively to 
sowing, as that season was now advancing. These handles were 
nearly in the form of the kirri, and about three feet long. The work 
now bestowed upon them, and which was performed with a common 
knife, was that of making them smooth and straight ; but it proceeded 
at an extremely slow rate, which plainly showed how little they 
valued time, or how little work they had to do. 
To make my sketch, I seated myself at the farthest part of the 
enclosure ; and during this time no one molested me with begging ; 
