As an instance of this the following may be quoted: —
Rations were being issued, and there were two parties to receive them, one of police and one of soldiers; the issuing officer was military. As the men were taking it away a policeman was overheard to say,
Soja ba su kuka'n soodi,
referring to the proverb No. 3, Mai chi da uwa ba shi kuka'n soodi, and meaning that the soldiers had got a very full share, as the officer issuing was, so to speak, their "uwa."
Also vide 293, &c.
A few general remarks on the Hausa and his language may not be out of place here.
There is, among people who have only a superficial knowledge, a tendency to regard Hausas, and indeed all black men, as stupid and thick-headed.
So far from being stupid, the Hausa has a very lively imagination and great intelligence. His point of view is different to that of a European, and his means of comparison more limited, but it is to our failure to appreciate this, rather than to his stupidity, that misunderstandings are generally due.
Hausa is not, strictly speaking, a written language, that is to say, it has no literature. It can be, and is, written in Arabic characters, formed in a very clumsy way by writing perpendicularly from top to bottom of the paper, which has to be turned round to read from right to left.
But any African, or for that matter European, language could, if required, be written in a similar way.
A much larger percentage of men can write than is usually supposed. One comes across them in every
