Page:Two kings of Uganda.djvu/105

The amount of property in calico and bark-cloth, buried with Namasole, was estimated at fifteen thousand pounds. Mackay ends this most interesting description by saying, "Who would have thought in the civilised world of burying fifteen thousand pounds worth of cloth in the grave of even a queen?"

But to return to the subject of Mutesa's own obsequies. At first the native smiths and carpenters undertook to make the coffins by their own unaided efforts, but the attempt was such a miserable failure that the chiefs had to beg Mackay to show them how the work was to be done. They said that there must be three coffins at least; but Mackay begged them to allow two to suffice. He then made a huge chest, on which he nailed brass and copper trays flattened out, and copper sheathing, together with the zinc lining of old cases which we had received filled with various stores. The copper and zinc represented the metal coffin, and the whole was covered on the outside with the fine white calico which in Buganda is only worn by the upper classes. The effect was considered satisfactory, and so the dead king was placed in this novel coffin, and buried in a grave which was dug in one of his largest houses.

The whole country went into mourning, and every one allowed his hair to grow. No white or coloured cloths were seen; the men were all clothed in the national costume of bark-cloth, knotted over the right

* In mourning, the ancient Egyptians allowed the hair and beard to grow. Herodotus, II. 36.