Sometimes, too, a compound, used as a name, is so contracted that its separate parts are scarcely recognisable. Mothers, when seated, hold their babies in their arms and on their knees, just as they do in other countries. But when walking about, they carry them on their backs, supported by a piece of cloth knotted in front, the two upper corners passing under the arms and over the breast, the lower round the waist; or, in some parts, by a goat-skin, with strings tied to the four legs. The babies develop a most marvellous power of holding on. One sees them sometimes spread out like the letter X; sometimes, when the cloth is quite firmly fixed, and allows of a comfortable attitude, seated in ‘the bight’ of it, with their feet appearing round the mother’s waist in front. I do not remember seeing babies seated astride the hip (as in India), but no doubt it is sometimes done, as shown in the group of Likoma Island women in the photograph. [Illustration: 1. WOMEN ON LIKOMA ISLAND 2. A MAKUA FAMILY] Babies are not dressed, but the mothers wash and oil them carefully, and hang a string of beads round their necks or waists, and a charm or two to keep them from sickness or accident. In some parts they shave their heads on both sides, leaving a little band in the middle, running from the forehead to the nape of the neck. Of course, in cold weather, they are wrapped in anything that comes handy, and the skin or cloth fastening them to the mother’s back keeps them as warm as clothing would do. When not being carried about, they are laid to sleep on a mat. They are not weaned till two or three years old—sometimes later; in tribes where cattle are not kept, it is somewhat difficult to get suitable food for them, but a kind of thin porridge or gruel is made. The Anyanja, though many of them keep goats, never drink milk.