which, he blew occasionally in the height of his excitement.
These instruments produced a sound partaking
of the braying of a donkey and the screech of an owl.
Crowds of men rushed round and round in a sort of
“ galop infernel,” brandishing their lances and ironheaded
maces, and keeping tolerably in line five or six
deep, following the leader who headed them, dancing
backwards. The women kept outside the line, dancing
a slow stupid step, and screaming a wild and most
inharmonious chaunt, while a long string of young
girls and small children, their heads and necks rubbed
with red ochre and grease, and prettily ornamented with
strings of beads around their loins, kept a very good
line, beating the time with their feet, and jingling the
numerous iron rings which adorned their ankles to keep
time with the drums. One woman attended upon the
men, running through the crowd with a gourd full of
wòod-ashes, handfuls of which she showered over their
heads, powdering them like millers ; the object of the
operation I could not understand. The “ première
danseuse” was immensely fat ; she had passed the
blopm of youth, but, “ malgré ” her unwieldy state, she
kept up the pace to, the last, quite'unconscious of her
général appearance, and absorbed with the excitement
of thé dancé,
Thesé festivitiés were to be continued in honour of