Page:Travel letters from New Zealand, Australia and Africa (1913).djvu/249

the faces of men. And a serious, important expression on the face of a barefoot man always amuses me. Anyone with grave duties to perform should, it seems to me, wear shoes. . . . There is a ricksha stand near the hotel, and every ricksha man carries a cow-bell, which he rings while on the road to warn pedestrians to get out of the way. These bells tinkle half the night, and remind me of a pasture wherein every cow is a bell-cow, and all of them vigorously fighting flies. . . . A good many American manufacturers seem to be establishing branches in London. I bought a bottle of Pond's Extract in Durban, and found that it was manufactured by the Pond's Extract Co., 65 Great Russell street, London. I bought a set of auto-strop razor blades, and found that they, also, came from London. Still, at the stores I find a great many familiar articles with only good old U. S. A. on them. . . . The charge here for an ordinary ricksha ride is six cents. If I am compelled to go up-town on an errand, the ricksha man waits, and when I return to the hotel, I pay him a sixpence, or twelve cents. In coming back from town this afternoon, I faced a terrific head-wind, with beating rain, and the ricksha man was almost stalled. But the price was only six cents each way. . . . I cannot recall having seen a single mulatto in this town; all the negroes seem to be of pure blood. Whatever else may be said of Englishmen, they seem to be particular in their social relations. . . . At seven o'clock this evening, the storm was worse than it has been at any time since Monday morning. The evening paper says the "Anchises" got away at 4 o'clock this afternoon, and