When they wish to plant indigo, the place chosen is one of a good strong clay or mould, and in a situation where there is moisture through the heat of the summer. After enclosing the ground, they clear it entirely of weeds, and burn them. The ground is well worked up by the hoe (they have no spade or pickaxe), and laid out in furrows, with a flat top, about a foot high, two broad, and six or seven inches between each furrow. The indigo seeds are then planted by the dibble, and just as the rains have begun: they cut it every year during the rainy season. A plantation will last four or five years without renewing the seeds. They crop it about three or four inches above the ground. The leaves are then stripped from the stems, and laid in a heap, exposed to the rains and weather for a month, until they ferment, when they are beaten in wooden troughs of a round form, and about two feet deep, and two feet in diameter; here they remain until dry, and are then considered as fit for use. One of these troughs of indigo, in the spring, costs three hundred cowries; in the summer, the price rises to six or seven hundred. The cotton is here planted in low situations, where the ground is partially covered with water during the rains, or else in a good clay that has moisture in it through the dry season. The ground, or plantation, is generally only surrounded by thorny branches stuck in the ground as a fence, then hoed well, and the clods, if any remain, broken. A hole is made with the hoe, and the seed is put in and lightly covered. If the season be abundant in rain, the cotton is plenty; if not, the crop is bad. The time of pulling is in the months of December and January. When worked, it is done by the women, clearing it of the seeds by two small iron pins, between which the cotton passes over a flat stone lying on the ground; the seeds are thrown behind them, the cotton before. The seeds they give to bullocks and camels, and are considered as very fattening. The cotton being prepared, is put on a distaff, which is short, light, neat, and small, great pains being taken in shaping and ornamenting it. The females who spin it have generally small looking-glasses in their baskets of cotton, with which they often survey their teeth and eyes. A piece of chalk, or pipe-clay, is in constant use, to rub the spinning thumb and finger. The occupation of spinning is generally assigned to married women, or some old female slave that is a favourite: weaving and sowing is left to the men. They have three different kinds of hoes: one with a handle of about five feet in length, and a small head stuck into the end of the staff; this is used in sowing the grain: one with a handle of about three feet in length, with a small iron head stuck into the end of the staff: the third, called gilma, has a short bent handle, with a large head, and is used in all the heavy work instead of a spade.