handkerchiefs all to the chief, and so secure him as an ally. Menon accepted the contribution, sent all the complainants quickly to the right about, and thus put an end to the whole affair.
The Makalakas appear to have very much the same aptitude for pilfering as the Masupias have for conjuring, and I was told of a circumstance which may serve to illustrate their thievish propensities. An ivory-trader purchased a tusk of a party of them and stowed it away in his waggon; another party soon afterwards brought a second tusk, but they asked a price for it so much higher that the trader hesitated; they urged him to have it weighed, and in the middle of the weighing process another lot of Makalakas arrived bringing a third tusk. Meantime, the first tusk was being deftly abstracted from the waggon. The men represented that they were in a great hurry, and induced the trader to buy the two tusks together. Having got their payment, the sellers made their way off quickly into the woods. The trader carried off his new purchase to compare what he had just bought with the tusk he had left in the waggon, and his chagrin may be better imagined than described when he found that the ivory had disappeared, and that after paying for three tusks he was only in possession of two.
As ivory can only be sold by clandestine means, when the natives want to dispose of any of the contraband article they generally come to a traveller in a party, and while some of them carry on the negotiations, the others watch their opportunity for laying their hands upon anything and everything within reach. It may almost be affirmed that nothing is safe except it has been tied or screwed to
