The Flesh,
Although Tolerably Good, Has A Slight Flavour Of Musk; This Is
Not Peculiar To The Gazelle, As The Odour Is Common To Most Of
The Small Varieties Of Antelopes.
Having a good supply of meat, all hands were busily engaged in
cutting it into strips and drying it for future use; the bushes
were covered with festoons of flesh of gazelles and hippopotami,
and the skins of the former were prepared for making girbas, or
water-sacks.
The flaying process for this purpose is a delicate
operation, as the knife must be so dexterously used that no false
cut should injure the hide. The animal is hung up by the hind
legs; an incision is then made along the inside of both thighs to
the tail, and with some trouble the skin is drawn off the body
towards the head, precisely as a stocking might be drawn from the
leg; by this operation the skin forms a seamless bag, open at
both ends. To form a girba, the skin must be buried in the earth
for about twenty hours: it is then washed in water, and the hair
is easily detached. Thus rendered clean, it is tanned by soaking
for several days in a mixture of the bark of a mimosa and water;
from this it is daily withdrawn, and stretched out with pegs upon
the ground; it is then well scrubbed with a rough stone, and
fresh mimosa bark well bruised, with water, is rubbed in by the
friction.
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