The climate of these districts is far more healthy than that of Kordofan. The dress of the natives is very simple. Only the grown-up people wear a piece of cotton stuff; the majority wear only a strip about as broad as the hand, passing a cord round their hips, with which they fasten it to the abdomen and back. In addition to this simple hip-cloth, they decorate themselves with ear-rings of brass or iron wire, and the women wear necklaces of Bohemian and Venetian glass beads. Some of the men wear a ribbon, about an ell in length, round their loins.[45] This ornament costs immense patience and no less trouble in its manufacture: it consists of a number of small buttons of about the size of a shirt-button, made of the shell of the ostrich’s egg, with a perforation in the centre, through which a string is passed, connecting them together. I took the trouble of counting the single buttons of one of these ribbons in my possession, and found a total number of six thousand eight hundred and sixty. Above and below they are frequently ornamented with small iron pins and glass beads. If we consider that these men possess no sharp cutting instruments to facilitate their labour, we may readily understand that great patience is required in the manufacture of one of these girdles. On some of the hills of the Nuba mountains the women dye their hair of a red colour, by reducing a species of red sandstone to a fine powder, which they mix with butter, and thus form a pomatum, with which they anoint their curls; it generally remains for a few days adherent to the hair, and gives them no very pleasing appearance. Incisions are made into the cheeks, arms, breasts, and bodies of the girls, by way of ornament. The household furniture of the Nuba negroes is very mean; it consists merely of a few pots, for water, for merissa and for cooking; and of a few drinking cups, made of gourds: the latter filled with water, serve the women in lieu of mirrors, which the girls frequently resort to during the day. The arms of the men, which they always carry about them, and scarcely ever lay aside, are a shield, spears with iron or wooden points, the latter always poisoned; a small double-edged knife; and a kind of scythe, consisting of a cutting blade, which is at first straight, but then cordiform in its curve, and about two feet in length. This weapon they denominate a Turbatsch, and use it in battle for warding off sabre-cuts, and throw it also at the feet of the enemy in an attack.