[29] There are many other branches of manufacture in Kanó which are too minute to be enumerated here. I will only mention the framing of the little looking-glasses, called lemmá, imported from Tripoli, and the immense variety of bótta or múrta, small leathern boxes. There is also a kind of small box made with great neatness from the kernel of the dúm-fruit.
[30] I need only refer to the memorable passage in his Journal, vol. ii., p. 203: “The best of the slaves now go to Niffee, to be there shipped for America. They are mostly males, and are minutely examined before departure.” (This latter circumstance agrees exactly with my own observations.) “From all reports there is an immense traffic of slaves that way exchanged against American goods, which are driving out of the markets all the merchandise of the north.” But another passage is not less clear, p. 228 f.: “Slaves are sent from Zínder to Niffee. Indeed it now appears that all this part of Africa is put under contribution to supply the South American market with slaves.”
[31] The names of the different kinds of beads, of which I have collected thirty-five, bear evident testimony to the imaginative powers and lively character of the Háusáwa.
[32] Originally these came from Nuremberg, but of late they have been also produced in Leghorn.
[33] I will here only mention, that the profit on the copper for the Jellába, if they do not go themselves to the hófra, but buy it in Dar-Fúr, is as follows:—In Fúr they buy the kantár of copper for one sedáshi (slave), equal to the value of a kantár of ivory, and sell it in Kúkawa for four thousand rottls, equal to two kantárs of ivory. In Kanó the price is about the same.
[34] There is no difference made between these two coins, women in general even preferring Maria Theresa to the columns on the Spanish dollar, which they fancy to represent cannon.
[35] Other people have stated to me that the kurdí-n-korófi did not exceed five hundred kurdí.
[36] “Chínna-n-yalá” is an interesting specimen of the corruption of a language in the border-districts; for while the words are Kanúri, they are joined according to the grammar of the Háusa language, for in Kanúri the expression ought to be “chínna yalabe.”
[37] “Búndi,” in Kanúri, means “wild beasts.” The inhabitants still bear the particular name of Ngúru-bú, plural of Ngúru-ma, from the name of the place or district Ngurú, generally called Ángarú.
[38] The termination-ma in Kanúri signifies the possession of a thing, and is equivalent to the mai- in Háusa, placed before a word. Thus bílla-ma is exactly identical with maí-gari, fír-ma with mai-dóki (the horseman), and so on. With this termination almost all the names of offices are formed in Kanúri, as yerí-ma, chiró-ma, kasél-ma, and so on. Thus also the governor of the province Múniyo or Mínyo bears the title Muniyó-ma or Minyó-ma, a name entirely misunderstood by Mr. Richardson. I will only add here that the title of the governor of the Gháladí in the Bórnu empire, on account of the immense extent of the latter, has been introduced into the list of offices of all the courts of Central Negroland, and that we find a ghaladíma in Sókoto as well as in every little town of Ádamáwa. The same is to be said of some offices originally belonging only to the court of the empire of Mélle, such as that of feréng or fárma, mánso, and others.