26 JOURNEY IN CENTRAL AFRICA.

bridegroom's father, where twenty or thirty Arabs, seated on the ground, were singing an epithalainium, to which they kept time by clapping their hands.

Next morning, while our rais was getting his permit to pass the locks (for which four official signatures and a fee of thirty piastres are necessary), we visited the bazaar, and purchased long tubes of jasmine-wood for our pipes, and vegetables for our kitchen. On all such occasions we detailed Seyd, the tall Nubian, whose ebony face shone resplendent under a snow-white turban, to be our attendant. The stately gravity with which he walked behind us, carrying bread and vegetables, was worthy the pipe-bearer of a Sultan. By this time we had installed the Asian as cook, and he very cheerfully undertook the service. We soon discovered that the skill of Ibrahim extended no further than to the making of 2i pilaff and the preparation of coffee.

Moreover his habits and appearance were not calculated to make us relish his handiwork. The naivete with which he took the wash-basin to make soup in, and wiped our knives and forks on his own baggy pantaloons, would have been very amusing if we had not been interested parties. The Asian was one day crumbling some loaf sugar with a hammer, when Ibrahim, who had been watching him, suddenly exclaimed in a tone of mingled pity and contempt, " that's not the way ! " Thereupon he took up some of the lumps, and wrapped them in one corner of his long white shirt, which he thrust into his mouth, and after srushing the sugar between his teeth, emptied it into the bowl with an air of triumph.

A whole squadron of boats was waiting at the locks, but with Frankish impudence, we pushed through them, and took »up place in the front rank. The sun was intensely hot, and