They Had Many Opportunities Of Observing The Fighi And Their Scholars Sitting On The Sand.

The children are taught their letters by having them written on a flat board, of a hard wood, brought from Bornou and Soudan, and repeating them after their master.

When quite perfect in their alphabet, they are allowed to trace over the letters already made, they then learn to copy sentences, and to write small words dictated to them. The master often repeats verses from the Koran, in a loud voice, which the boys learn by saying them after him, and when they begin to read a little, he sings aloud, and all the scholars follow him from their books, as fast as they can. Practice at length renders them perfect, and in three or four years their education is considered complete. Thus it is, that many who can read the Koran with great rapidity, cannot peruse a line of any other book. Arithmetic is wholly put of the question. On breaking up for the day, the master and all the scholars recite a prayer. The school-hours are by no means regular, being only when the fighi has nothing else to do. Morning early, or late in the evening, are the general times for study. The punishments are beating with a stick on the hands or feet and whipping, which is not unfrequently practised. Their pens are reeds - their rubber sand. While learning their tasks, and perhaps each boy has a different one, they all read aloud, so that the harmony of even a dozen boys may be easily imagined.

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