There Were Dozens Of Carts Crowded With The Bright-Eyed Women, In Petticoats Of Every Most Brilliant Colour, White Muslin Jackets, And Gold Daggers In Their Great Coils Of Shining Black Hair.

All most 'anstandig', as they always are.

Their pleasure is driving about en famille; the men have no separate amusements. Every spare corner in the cart is filled by the little soft round faces of the intelligent-looking quiet children, who seem amused and happy, and never make a noise or have the fidgets. I cannot make out why they are so well behaved. It favours A-'s theory of the expediency of utter spoiling, for one never hears any educational process going on. Tiny Mohammed never spoke but when he was spoken to, and was always happy and alert. I observed that his uncle spoke to him like a grown man, and never ordered him about, or rebuked him in the least. I like to go up the hill and meet the black women coming home in troops from the washing place, most of them with a fat black baby hanging to their backs asleep, and a few rather older trotting alongside, and if small, holding on by the mother's gown. She, poor soul, carries a bundle on her head, which few men could lift. If I admire the babies, the poor women are enchanted; - du reste, if you look at blacks of any age or sex, they MUST grin and nod, as a good-natured dog must wag his tail; they can't help it. The blacks here (except a very few Caffres) are from the Mozambique - a short, thick-set, ugly race, with wool in huge masses; but here and there one sees a very pretty face among the women.

Enter page number Go  Previous Next
Page 133 of 141
Words from 35607 to 35900 of 37925