8 UGANDA AND THE EGYPTIAN SOUDAN.

by the Hindu women. A little beyond this the hum

of many voices strikes the ear, and we pause opposite an Arab school ; here some thirty or forty youngsters

are squatting on the ground, reciting passages from

the Koran in a monotonous chant, swaying their

bodies to and fro as they read ; while at one end a

long-bearded, spectacled Mwalirnu, or dominie, pre-

sides. Presently an unlucky urchin makes a false

quantity, and promptly receives a dig in the chest

from the dominie's cane, and is sent sprawling on

his back, but he quickly rights himself, and proceeds

with his reading in the same dismal strain. Thread-

ing our way through the narrow winding streets,

passing the shops of the ivory dealers, where piles of

the huge tusks, which first saw the light in some

far-off forest on the shores of the Nyanza or banks

of the Lualaba, lie waiting for shipment to Europe,

watched over by solemn-faced, placid Hindus or Ban-

yans, we turn down into the soko, or market-place. Here an animated scene meets the eye

: dealers in

almost every imaginable thing that can be bought or

sold are here to

, be found with their wares. The

whole of the large open space extending from the

custom-house between the Fort and the Sultan's

palace to the centre of the town is filled with a dense

crowd, bargaining, chaffering, arguing, quarrelling, and minding every one's business except their own. Bound every group of sellers a throng of people is

gathered, the greater number being merely on-