In matters, however, regarding war and the preparations required for a jehad, it is entirely different. Blacksmiths are always busy forging spears and knives; and in this description of work the results are remarkable. Saddlers make every description of leather ornament for horse and camel decoration; tanners prepare the leather, and dye it red or black; tailors now make much better jibbehs than before; the patches are generally made of good cloth, and the best garments are now valued at about sixteen dollars each. The women spin the cotton, and the men weave the dammur from it. The best dammur comes from Berber and Metemmeh. The Darfur women are also famed for their good and even spinning; but Abyssinian dammur is generally considered better than any of Sudan manufacture. Tin-smiths make drinking cups and tin receptacles of various sorts for household use. Cooking-pots are made of copper. Jewellers make gold and silver filigree work for the ladies; but this work is not nearly as good as it used to be in the days of the Egyptian Government. All these various trades are carried on in the market. [Illustration: A SLAVE-GIRL FROM EQUATORIA.] Mahdiism has re-established the slave trade, which is now in full vigour, and almost all those slaves who were liberated in the Government days have been sold again as slaves. Wherever there is a beit el mal there is also a slave-market. The largest is, of course, in Omdurman, to which all captured slaves are sent. The beit el mal sells the slaves by auction. Well-grown male slaves are generally taken into the army. Close to the beit el mal is the female slave-market, where generally fifty or sixty women of various ages are to be found. The slave-dealers are for the most part Egyptians. The slaves are arranged in lines under the open sky; their bodies are generally well bathed in oil to preserve the gloss of their skin. Intending purchasers make the most careful and minute examination, and the price varies from twenty to a hundred dollars. Young females are kept apart from the rest, as they are generally selected as concubines, and as such they are subjected to a most critical scrutiny; the shape of their hands and feet, and the form of their mouth, nose, ears and teeth are all carefully noted. Black are preferable to copper-coloured slaves, and the latter colour necessitates a considerable reduction in price. Young male slaves are sold at from thirty to sixty dollars each, and these have generally to learn a trade. Purchasers ask all sorts of searching questions as to whether they have good moral qualities, are likely to run away, &c., &c. The salesman must produce a certificate showing the tribe, a full descriptive return, and the legal authority entitling to ownership.