292 TRAVELS IN AFRICA, 
motions. Such is their fondnefs for this amufement, that the 
Haves dance in fetters to the mufic of a Uttle drum ; and, what 
I have rarely feen in Africa or the Eaft, the time is marked by 
means of a long ftick held by two, while others beat the cadence 
with fliort batons. 
They ufe the games of Tab-ii-duk and Dns-iva-talaite, de- 
fcribed by Niebuhr, which however appear not indigenous, but 
to have been borrowed of the Arabs. 
The vices of thieving, lying, and cheating in bargains, with 
all others nearly or remotely allied to them, as often happen 
among a people under the fame circumftances, are here almoft 
univerfal. No property, whether confiderable or trifling, is fafe 
out of the fight of the owner, nor indeed fcarcely in it, unlefs 
he be ftronger than the thief. In buying and felling the parent 
glories in deceiving the fon, and the fon the parent ; and God 
and the Prophet are hourly invocated, to give colour to the moft 
palpable frauds and falfehoods. 
The privilege of polygamy, which, as is well known, be- 
longs to their religion, the people of Soudan pufh to the ex- 
treme. At this circumftance the MuiTelmans of Egypt, with 
whom I have converfed on the fubje£t, affed; to be much fcan- 
dalized : for whereas, by their law they are allowed four free 
women, and as many Haves as they can conveniently maintain, 
the Furians take both free women and flaves without any limit- 
ation. The Sultan has more than an hundred free women, and 
many of the Meleks have from twenty to thirty. Teraub, a 
late 
