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Science of Seership

Geoffrey Hodson

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mile, over which families or clans are spread, each with its separate group of earth and wood “houses”. Most of these are below the ground level, with entrances built above it, making a kind of arched doorway. In some cases the walls of these arches are only about a foot thick, and consist of earth moistened and plastered on both sides of a cone-shaped frame-work of plaited branches; in other cases the lateral spaces between the top of the arches and the ground-level are filled in with earth, making large mounds about six or eight feet in height. Sometimes two of these face each other at a distance of eight or ten feet; others again are arranged roughly in circular form with all the entrances facing inwards. The effect of this last arrangement seen from a distance is that of a rounded knoll; but at close quarters, if one climbs on to the summit of the mound, one looks down into the circle where the ground is lower. In one particular circle there are two entrances on opposite sides of the circle. There are no houses at these points, but the soil has been heaped up to complete the circle. Looking round the countryside, many of these circular villages can be seen, all much alike in construction but varying considerably in size and height. Some of them are terraced on the outside. Rough though these people are, there is a distinct air of domesticity about their villages, and however uncouth may be their behaviour to outsiders, they are very friendly among themselves. At first they appeared to be exactly alike, but on closer study differences are detected in their appearances, particularly in the case of the women, the colour of whose hair and complexion varies considerably. The circle may be composed of the members of a family, and there is a gigantic man, rather beyond middle age but still in full possession of his faculties and his great physical strength, who appears to be the head. There are numbers of children running about naked, and one woman is sitting, facing the sun, at the entrance of her “house” With a baby at her breast. Though the children are treated with great tolerance by the men and are allowed many liberties, such as swarming up their great hairy legs, they appear to be handled very roughly. A man picks up a child by one of its arms and swings it up on to his shoulder in a very rough way; another man throws a child from his knee to a distance of some yards, but in neither case do the children seem to be seriously hurt. As this last child fell it showed a peculiar formation of the base of the spine, which arrested attention. Instead of running straight, or with a slight curve into
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