Page:First Footsteps in East Africa, 1894 - Volume 1.djvu/171

 whilst the camel's is slightly soured. The townspeople use camel's milk medicinally: according to the Bedouins, he who lives on this beverage, and eats the meat for forty-four consecutive days, acquires the animal's strength. It has perhaps less "body" than any other milk, and is deliciously sweet shortly after foaling: presently it loses flavour, and nothing can be more nauseous than the produce of an old camel. The Somal have a name for cream--"Laben"--but they make no use of the article, churning it with the rest of the milk. They have no buffaloes, shudder at the Tartar idea of mare's-milk, like the Arabs hold the name Labban [50] a disgrace, and make it a point of honor not to draw supplies from their cattle during the day. The life led by these wild people is necessarily monotonous. They rest but little--from 11 P.M. till dawn--and never sleep in the bush, for fear of plundering parties, Few begin the day with prayer as Moslems should: for the most part they apply themselves to counting and milking their cattle. The animals, all of which have names [51], come when called to the pail, and supply the family with a morning meal. Then the warriors, grasping their spears, and sometimes the young women armed only with staves, drive their herds to pasture: the matrons and children, spinning or rope-making, tend the flocks, and the kraal is abandoned to the very young, the old, and the sick. The herdsmen wander about, watching the cattle and tasting nothing but the pure element or a pinch of coarse tobacco. Sometimes they play at Shahh, Shantarah, and other games, of which they are passionately fond: with a board formed of lines traced in the sand, and bits of dry wood