I I
■ i ’i
on a belt which is wojn round the loins, like those in
the Shir tribe ; thus the toilette is completed at once.
It would be highly useful, could they only wag their
tails to whisk off the flies which are torments in this
country.
The cattle are very small; the goats and sheep are
quite Lilliputian, but they generally give three at a
birth, and thus multiply quickly. The people of the
country were formerly friendly, but the Khartoumers
pillage and murder them at discretion in all directions ;
thus, in revenge, they will shoot a poisoned arrow at a
stranger unless he is powerfully escorted. The effect
of the poison used for the arrow-heads is very extraordinary.
A man came to me for medical a id ; five
months ago he had been wounded by a poisoned arrow
in the leg, below the calf, and the entire foot had been
eaten away by the action of the poison. The bone
rotted through just above the ankle, and the foot
dropped off. The most violent poison is the produce
of the root of a tree, whose milky juice yields a resin
that is smeared upon the arrow. I t is brought from a
great distance, from some country far west of Gondokoro.
The juice of the species of euphorbia, common
in these countries, is also used for poisoning arrows.
Boiled to the consistence of tar, it is then smeared
upon the blade. The action of the poison is to corrode