hanks of rope are also a great trade article. We gave rope for 
watermelons at Kodak* 
6 / 2/55 
17 
it’s not easy to learn vAiat’s going on in this floating ant-hill 
the running back and forth over theplank gang-way with the various 
articles of food and trade being carried back and forth is more ant-like 
than human. Have I already made this ccsnparison, [jfes you will have 
guessed I’m having ball point pen (or pencil) trouble, lost two good 
ones, and have now dredged an old one. I used in France frcwi the 
botton of my brief case,— both ’’writing" and "pencil" seem to get 
worse as the trip progresses. Sorry. 3 At Salem Banga there is a 
large Catholic mission but we saw little evidence of it. A protestant 
missionary came down to the water’s edge to tall^o a construction man, 
Penn, dutchnan, name of Pollock who works out of Malakal. Has been 
here 5 years and goes from mission to superintend construction of 
buildings by native labor, has a half dozen trained versatile natives 
■(dio can handle plumbing, painting, carpentry, iron sroithins and cement 
work, and instruct other natives in these tasks besides doing the 
more difficult parts of jobs themselves. Natives in the capacities 
get 69-70 piasters a day (|1,80 to$2.10); the more eoiranon labor they 
instruct or directly supervise get about 6 plasters a day (18 cents) 
in this part of the Nile the more isolated places to 8a day (2li cents) 
in places like Malakal. We did not stay long in Salem Banga, 
This day was one of the wannest yet, 98 degrees in the shade, 99 
in our roctn where, though fan was blowing, I believe was hotter because 
of it, — the motor housing gets /// pretty warm, yet you must have the 
breeze engendered by fan or boat motion otherwise you would really notice 
the heat (humidity must b^ow though). 
