s "civilised" son,
for with all his faults he looked a man. A chum of mine who knew the ways
of these people had advised me to purchase a horn of snuff before being
presented to the bride and groom, and I had acted accordingly.

When the ceremony of introduction was over, and I had managed to turn my
blushing face away from "Ma" and the bevy of damsels, as airily clothed as
herself, I offered the snuff box to the happy pair. The groom took a tiny
pinch and smiled sadly, as though committing some deadly sin. The bride,
however, poured a little heap in the palm of her hand about as big as a
hen's egg, regardless of her nice white kid gloves. This she proceeded to
snuff up her capacious nostrils with savage delight, until the tears
streamed down her cheeks like rain down a coal heap. Then she threw back
her head, spread her hands out palm downwards, like a mammoth duck treading
water, and sneezed. I never heard a human sneeze like that before; it was
like the effort of a horse after a two-mile gallop through a dust storm.
And each time she sneezed something connected with her wedding gear ripped
or gave way, until I began to be afraid for her. But the wreck was not
quite so awful as I had anticipated, and when she had done sneezing she
laughed. All the crowd except the groom laughed, and the sound of their
laughter was like the sound of the sea on a cliff-crowned coast.

A little later one of the bridesmaids, whose toilet consisted of a dainty
necklace of beads and a copper ring around one ankle, invited me to drink a
draught of native beer. The beer was in a large calabash, and I felt
constrained to drink some of it. These natives know how to make love, and
they know how to make war, but, as my soul liveth, they don't know how to
make beer. The stuff they gave me to drink was about as thick as
boardinghouse cocoa; in colour it was like unto milk that a very dirty maid
of all work had been stirring round in a soiled soup dish with an unwashed
forefinger. It had neither body nor soul in it, and was as insipid as a
policeman at a prayer meeting. Some of the niggers got gloriously merry on
it, and sang songs and danced weird, unholy dances under its influence. But
it did not appeal to me in that way, possibly I was not educated up to its
niceties. All I know is that I became possessed of a strange yearning to
get rid of what had been given me--and get rid of it early.

The wedding joys were of a peculiar nature. Bride and bri