246 AFRICAN WANDERINGS.

lous villages among its hills. The inhabitants of Basa are to be praised for allowing no thievings to go on among them ; one may lay down his goods by the wayside, and no one will touch them. None commence harvest till all go. Circumcision is usual among the men, but not as a religious rite. Elephants are in great numbers, and these are the principal objects of their hunts. The elephant hunters are called Agar, and for this reason my brother's slave of the Basa race, got the surname of Agar, as his father was a famed elephant hunter. The method of killing elephants is, while one hunter well mounted attracts the monster's attention in front, another behind cuts with a sword the back sinews of the leg, a deed not only requiring much strength, but also high courage and dexterity. Besides corn, they cultivate simsim (sesame).

Children are fed on milk and honey ; grown persons consume merissa and lochma. Flesh is little used ; the head of the elephant is, however, highly famed, as also the cap of the foot. ITie climate is healthy, and the people hale and cheerful. The troops returned from thence highly delighted with the burmas, filled with honey and merissa, which they found in great plenty in the larger tokuls of these people.

All speak of a Bellad-el-Kelb (Dog-land); the women there are not disfigured, but the men have dogs' faces, feet with claws, and tails like apes ; they cannot speak, though the women well understand what the men mean by the wagging of their tails I This land of dogs is at one time said to be on the frontier of the Habesch, at another on those of Darfur, now Felatta, and so on. A land inhabited by Fellati who are clothed, was mentioned to me when voyaging on the White Nile ; and there was also pointed out to me, under 4° N. latitude, the hills of Lokoja, where it was said there was a race of men with dogs' heads who were cannibals.

Afterwards we heard that the Wadi-el-Kelb was tlius named, from the inhabitants being great robbers who held fast to their prey like dogs. The great Sheik Abu Sin, however, informed us, that this land was only six hours' journey distant from here, and that its Sheik bore the title of honour of Wod Kelb, which probably had been the title or name of some earlier renowned irab chief, and that this Wod Kelb, who some seven years before had defeated a part of the army of Churschid Pascha, and would not