Water-bottles.
Contrasted with the rest of Africa, and even with the Bongo, whose comparative skill was noticed on a previous page,[26] the district shows a very considerable advance in the manufacture of their pottery. Although they remain as unacquainted as other races with the use of the wheel, their productions, besides being of a superior quality, are of a more perfect symmetry than any which are elsewhere observed. All the vessels and drinking-cups of the Africans in general have the character of urns, being made without handles and being never otherwise than spherical in form; but those of the Monbuttoo exhibit a manifest improvement, and by having the surface decorated either with some raised symmetrical pattern (which is especially the case upon their oil vessels) or with some ornamental figures, they afford a firm hold to the hand, and thus make good the lack of handles for lifting them. It is, however, principally upon the water-bottles that the greatest care is bestowed, some of which may fairly be said to rival in symmetry the far-famed examples of Egyptian art, and to betray a considerable faculty of plastic genius.[27]
GRASS ORNAMENTS.
For the bowls of pipes, upon which other of the native populations lavish so much care, they have no use. They smoke only the Virginian tobacco, and for this purpose employ the midrib of the plantain leaf in the way that I have already described,[28] superseding entirely the necessity for a solid bowl.
They are very ignorant of the art of leather-dressing, and are no more acquainted with the use of tan than any of the rest of the tribes that have their homes in the Bahr-el-Ghazal district.
Their baskets and nets are woven out of rotang, the form of the baskets in which they bear burdens on their backs being very similar to those which are seen amongst the Thuringians. Their mode of dressing their hair necessarily prevents them from ever carrying a load upon their heads.
They are in the habit of twisting ornaments for themselves out of reeds and grass, which they wear like rings round their arms and legs, and which make a rustling sound as they walk. They bestow a great amount of care in weaving the fine webs which hold on their hats and chignons. The rattles, filled with shells and pebbles, that are used for beating time to the music of the drums and horns at the great festivals are also woven from reeds.
The Monbuttoo musical instruments require no particular description. They do not include the pretty little mandolins of the Niam-niam, nor any other stringed instruments, and their horns, trumpets, and drums may be said to be little short of universal throughout Africa. Wooden dulcimers (Marimba) are met with neither here nor in South Africa.
But the artistic versatility of the people reveals itself more than anywhere else in their architectural skill. It would hardly be credited that Africa would be capable of rearing any erection so spacious and well proportioned as the hall of Munza’s palace. This was little short of 150 feet in length and 60 feet in breadth, and rose to the height of about 50 feet. Combined with these imposing dimensions were a lightness of character and solidity of structure that were quite remarkable. The ever-useful leaf-stalks of the wine-palm form the principal building-material, and its natural polish and bright brown colour give every building for which it is used an aspect of finished grace. The flat horizontal roofs of their huts, as distinguished from the conical roofs which we have hitherto observed as almost universal throughout the rest of Central Africa, mark out these Monbuttoo in a fresh respect as being allied to the natives of the west, viz., the Ishogo, the Ashango, the Bakalai, the Ashiva, the Camma, the Mpongwe, and the Fan—a relation that is further confirmed by the physical character of the land, the streams of which flow to the west instead of to the north. Some of the huts, however, have conical roofs, and these are generally appropriated, either as kitchens, because they allow better escape for the smoke, or as granaries, because they throw off the rain more rapidly.