146 UGANDA AND THE EGYPTIAN SOUDAN.

teen years old, and, perhaps, for this reason are more prolific. The children do not sleep in the same huts as the parents, but have special huts for themselves. This is not the case with the other tribes between here and Lado. The Bongos have the exceedingly ugly custom of enlarging the lips of their women. A hole is first bored through each lip, and a plug of wood put into the hole, the plug being gradually enlarged until the wood is often two inches and a half in diameter. Small pieces of wood are frequently put through the edges of the ears, and sometimes six or seven may be seen through each nostril. We were warned not to kill the hyeena in these parts, as the natives, like the Arabs farther north, think that old people —women especially—have the power of entering into a hyfena, and that in this form they j)rowl about at night.

An hour after leaving Gok we came to a swamp varying from two to five feet in depth; it was full of fish, and had a slight current to the east. A small river, Khor Niakok, flows through it with a current of half a knot. Two hours and a half were occupied in wading through the swamp. We camped at night at a village called Shwelle or Boit, as we had started later than usual, we did not arrive until an hour after sunset ; and the natives enlivened the march by most unearthly yells, in order to frighten away the lions, which are numerous in