NATIVE WOMEN. 93 which to a European seems most uncomfortable and almost impossible. The accompanying wood-cut is engraved from a photograph which Aylmer took on the Mareb. The men had no idea at the time, that they were being taken, so that the position is a perfectly natural one.

The next day Lort Phillips, Colvin, and I, with two of the horsemen and three or four Base, rode up to the village of Koolookoo. Just before reaching the huts, we passed, on our right, the remains of a house built of sun-dried brick, which had evidently been a much more substantial dwelling than any the natives ever build. This house, we were told, had been erected by Mr. Powell, an English gentleman, who with his wife and child had been murdered by the Base some twelve or fourteen years ago. Mr. Powell was the brother of the unfortunate gentleman who recently perished in a balloon-accident ; he had spent some time at Koolookoo, and had entered the country from the north. They were massacred, not at Koolookoo itself, but by some people who lived not far off, the same who made the raid on Haikota, which has previously been mentioned.

Koolookoo is a very small place, and the conical-roofed huts present much the appearance of large bee-hives. There was merely the semblance of a path leading up to it ; and the latter part of the way was so steep we were obliged to dismount, and proceed on foot.

The women were particularly shy, and most of them nearly naked ; all wore beads and cowrie-shells, if they had little else ; a few wore anklets made of the skin of some wild animal ; one carried a skin cross-belt. We took a number of little things with us to give away, as we were anxious to conciliate the people as much as possible. I offered one woman some needles and thread ; a gift she declined, complaining very sorrowfully that they were useless to her, as she had no clothes, and con-