292 
A CLASS OF MENDICANTS. 
to our hut while it rained, saying she feared being 
seen if coming at any other time, and wanted medi- 
cine. They are of an average height, and appear 
healthy, though their husbands complain that their 
offspring do not survive many years. An officer made 
a sad complaint to us, saying that if his wife had a 
child to a servant it always lived, but any she had to 
himself died. An extraordinary little old man, not 
more than three feet in height (correctly drawn in 
Speke's ' Journal ; ), paid us a visit. He was perfectly 
sensible, though very restless while sitting for his por- 
trait, constantly moving his head or holding up his 
fingers close to his one eye. In contrast to this 
dwarf, the king had a man who looked a giant iu 
strength, though scarcely six feet in height. He was 
employed in conveying messages to us, and could go 
through all the motions of a warlike attack, wielding 
his spear with grace and agility, struggling with his 
enemy, planting his foot triumphantly on the dead 
body, snorting, and finishing off by wiping his spear- 
head upon the grass to free it from his supposed an- 
tagonist's blood. 
A class of mendicants or gentle beggars called "Band- 
wa," allied to the Wichwezee, seem spread all over these 
kingdoms. They adorn themselves with more beads, 
bells, brass, and curiosities than any other race, and 
generally carry an ornamented tree-creeper in their 
hands. Many of their women look handsome and 
captivating when dressed up in variously - coloured 
skins, and wearing a small turban of bark-cloth. One 
man amongst them wore, from the crown of his head 
down his back, the skin of a tippet-monkey, to which 
he had attached the horns of an antelope. They wan- 
