A Latooka was hoeing close to where it fell, and we
distinctly saw him pick up the bird and run to a bush, in which he hid
it: upon our arrival he continued his work as though nothing had
happened, and denied all knowledge of it: he was accordingly led by the
ear to the bush, where we found the duck carefully secreted.
June 14.---The natives lost one man killed in the fight yesterday,
therefore the night was passed in singing and dancing.
The country is drying up; although the stream is full there is no rain
in Latooka, the water in the river being the eastern drainage of the
Obbo mountains, where it rains daily.
Ibrahimawa, the Bornu man, alias "Sinbad the Sailor," the great
traveller, amuses and bores me daily with his long and wonderful stories
of his travels. The style of his narratives may be conjectured from the
following extracts: "There was a country adjoining Bornu, where the king
was so fat and heavy that he could not walk, until the doctors OPENED
HIS BELLY AND CUT THE FAT OUT, which operation was repeated annually."
He described another country as a perfect Paradise, where no one ever
drank anything so inferior as water. This country was so wealthy that
the poorest man could drink merissa (beer). He illustrated the general
intoxication by saying, that "after 3 P.
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