178 
MADAGASCAR. 
most unblushing body-snatching under our very 
eyes for some time there, and which we were 
powerless to stop. He usually went to some 
mother with a large family, or some poor Betsi- 
misaraka chief who had a large number of slaves, 
and under pretence of hiring a likely lad or 
youth, would engage his services for some weeks 
for a rice-collecting voyage up one or other of 
the rivers towards the interior of the island. All 
would go well till some obscure town or village 
had been reached, when the rascally Arab would 
then proceed to hawk the boy about for sale. Of 
course the wretched victim of the plot denied 
bitterly that he was the slave of the Arab. But 
this was of no avail in most cases, as it is not an 
uncommon thing for slaves to deny ownership if 
they do not want to be sold away from their 
home and kindred. The miserable lad would be 
parted with for half his value probably, and in 
due course the Arab would reappear at AndA 
voranto with the blandest of faces, and the most 
sympathetic of voices, and handing the mother 
or the master a dollar, would say that, alas ! for 
poor boto (the boy), he had been eaten by a 
crocodile, after repeated warnings from him as to 
incautious bathing in the streams. Sometimes 
the tale was varied to tazo (fever), or latsak in 
drano (drowned) ; but unfortunately on one 
occasion the youth himself reappeared, after 
