“Our reception amongst them was most hospitable, and in the vicinity of the chief’s huts we were accommodated with strong wooden sheds, about six feet high, upon which their corn, divested of its reeds, was prettily stacked, consisting of different kinds of dourra of different colours—white, grey, and red—in separate batches. The stacks were formed with much taste, the sides being perpendicular, terminating in a cone. The precaution of raising their stacks so high from the ground was to preserve it from vermin and the white ants.
“The Dôr surpass the Djour in industry, a proof of which existed in their extensive fields and granaries. Prior to the rainy season, their grain was threshed and preserved in large cylindrical receptacles, constructed of reeds and clay, from twelve to fifteen feet in diameter, and four feet in height, supported upon a strong wood framework some four feet from the ground. To preserve its contents from the rain, it was covered by a large thatched framework, not unlike an extinguisher in shape, and was so light in substance, that when the grain was required, one side of it could be lifted and supported by a pole, and the granary entered.[[75]]
“Their huts were constructed of a beautiful basket-work of cane. The perpendicular walls were six feet high, and were surmounted with a pretty cupola-shaped reed roof, topped with wood carvings of birds. A wooden bedstead occupied its centre, and an oval-shaped hole, two and a half feet high, barely sufficient to admit a man in a stooping posture, formed the doorway. At night this was barricaded with logs of wood laid horizontally upon each other, between perpendicular posts.
“Cooking was carried on in a separate hut, and in lieu of the stone-mill in use in the Soudan, a large wooden mortar, the pestle some four or five feet in length, by three inches diameter, served as their flour-mill. Their food consisted principally of a thick porridge, and a sauce flavoured with herbs and red pepper; but beef, whenever they could obtain it by barter for grain with the Djour, or meat from the chase, was preferred. Rats, mice, and snakes were highly esteemed, and of these the children were continually in search. Fowls were reared to a great extent, but from some unaccountable superstition they were only considered proper food for women: if eaten by men, it was a proof of effeminacy.
“The Dôr territories are more considerable than any I had yet traversed; and their language, the nouns of which generally terminated in o or a, was entirely different from any that I had heard. The men were shorter in stature than the tall Dinka Shillooks, but broader in the chest and stouter-limbed.
“Total nudity was held in contempt by them, although their covering was reduced to the smallest possible amount; and when the Djour entered their village, the little hide ornament worn by them in common with the Dinka tribes, as a mark of respect was turned round to the front.
“Of a dark brown colour, they further differed from the negroes hitherto described, in the preservation of their teeth and the difference of their weapons: these consisted of bows and arrows, fearfully-barbed lances, and a variety of clubs. Some resembled the mace of the Middle Ages, whilst others, made of hard wood, were like the mushroom. The edges were firm and sharp, and when employed against an enemy would cleave the skull. The points of their arrows, made of iron, are also numerously barbed; the workmanship, in a variety of patterns, is admirable.
“The Dôr perhaps excel the Djour in smithery; and, possessing no cattle, their valuables consist in objects of iron, mostly in circular plates from nine inches to one foot in diameter, and long ornamented lance-like articles. For a certain number of these they intermarry.
“Goats and fowls are their only domestic animals; the former a short-legged and smooth-haired variety. The coat is fine, and coloured frequently with large round spots of black, yellow, or brown upon white: they are not milked, although, when taken to Khartoum and crossed with the native race, they become excellent milkers.
“The women would be handsome were it not for a disfiguration of the under lip, in which circular pieces of wood are inserted, varying in size, according to age, from a sixpence to a florin. The young women are naked, but the married women wear large clusters of green leaves in front and behind, which, attached by a belt to the waist, reach to the ankles. Clean in their habits, they are particular in the daily renewal of their costume from the bush, the numerous evergreens and creeping plants affording them an abundant material for that purpose.