STAY AT SAY 329 Safarikoy ! and I asked myself, what would be the duty of a doctor in this bigoted land if he had had the necessary instruments for meeting the unfortunate girl's wishes.

Perhaps it was as well that in this case nothing could be done.

Ail the same this domestic drama was very heart-rending. I tried for a long time to console our visitors. The old woman stuck to her request for medicine, and promised to reward us with everything she could think of likely to please us. She even offered us her daughter, sayipg that she might remain with us, and could follow us wherever we went.

I told Digui to get rid of them as gently as possible, and gave them a good present to enable them to reach some heathen village where the people would have pity on them.

They departed at last, the mother's tears soaking her tattered garments, the daughter following her, her little feet swollen with walking, and her head drooping in her despair.

A propos of this episode, Suleyman the interpreter held forth in the following strain — " From the earliest times prophets, marabouts, and the negro chiefs who founded the religious dynasty of the country, have been terribly severe on any lapse from morality amongst their women, but it is all humbug, for most of the marabouts are the fathers of illegitimate children.

"Amongst Amadu's people the man and woman who have sinned are deprived of all their property, but Abdul Bubakar goes still further, for he sacks the entire village to which a frail woman belongs, a capital way of getting slaves and everything else. In other districts the woman is put in irons, but the man goes free ; but if the seducer comes forward and owns his crime, he can obtain remission of the punishment by payment of a large sum to the chief