My Advice Is That You
Rigidly Stick To Missus Or Mammy.
I have seen this done most
successfully.
The ladies are almost as varied in their costume as the gentlemen,
but always neater and cleaner; and mighty picturesque they are too,
and occasionally very pretty. A market-woman with her jolly brown
face and laughing brown eyes - eyes all the softer for a touch of
antimony - her ample form clothed in a lively print overall, made
with a yoke at the shoulders, and a full long flounce which is
gathered on to the yoke under the arms and falls fully to the feet;
with her head done up in a yellow or red handkerchief, and her snowy
white teeth gleaming through her vast smiles, is a mighty pleasant
thing to see, and to talk to. But, Allah! the circumference of
them!
The stone-built, white-washed market buildings of Free Town have a
creditably clean and tidy appearance considering the climate, and
the quantity and variety of things exposed for sale - things one
wants the pen of a Rabelais to catalogue. Here are all manner of
fruits, some which are familiar to you in England; others that soon
become so to you in Africa. You take them as a matter of course if
you are outward bound, but on your call homeward (if you make it)
you will look on them as a blessing and a curiosity. For lower
down, particularly in "the Rivers," these things are rarely to be
had, and never in such perfection as here; and to see again
lettuces, yellow oranges, and tomatoes bigger than marbles is a
sensation and a joy.
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