NEW GROUND. 
217 
and love of display amongst them, which is as 
ludicrous as, perhaps, it is human. 
The people are scattered, dwelling for the 
most part in the valleys by the river banks. 
Eice is cultivated to some extent in the eastern 
part of the province ; but in the west the food of 
the people consists of a kind of arrowroot ob¬ 
tained from the root of the Tacca pinnatifida. 
The principal river in the Bara country is the 
Menarahaka. It takes its rise in the hills of 
the same name, and flows into the valley of 
Iroka in a succession of marshes, where it re¬ 
ceives the small river of Ibehasy; it thence winds 
round to the north-west as far as Ivato, and 
afterwards southward for about twenty miles 
through a lovely valley as far as the mountain 
of Imenavala, where it receives the large river 
of Isahambanga, and those which drain the 
eastern side of Xlamboanana. The course is now 
south-east for about thirty miles, through a wide 
plain, until it enters the mountains in the south 
of Isantsa, where it receives the Inaivo, a large 
and important river, and Ranomena, which rises 
very close to the source of the Menarahaka, 
and flows directly south round the mountain of 
Ivohibe to its junction with the main stream 
entering the forest. This magnificent river takes 
the name of Mananzara, and flows eastward to 
the sea near Yangaindrano. 
