Most were small, none seen on this journey exceeding half an acre; but on the former trip some were observed of more than twice that size.
The "tonje cadja," or indigenous cotton, is of shorter staple, and feels in the hand like wool.

This kind has to be planted every season in the highlands; yet, because it makes stronger cloth, many of the people prefer it to the foreign cotton; the third variety is not found here.

It was remarked to a number of men near the Shire Lakelet, a little further on towards Nyassa, "You should plant plenty of cotton, and probably the English will come and buy it." "Truly," replied a far-travelled Babisa trader to his fellows, "the country is full of cotton, and if these people come to buy they will enrich us." Our own observation on the cotton cultivated convinced us that this was no empty flourish, but a fact.

Everywhere we met with it, and scarcely ever entered a village without finding a number of men cleaning, spinning, and weaving.

It is first carefully separated from the seed by the fingers, or by an iron roller, on a little block of wood, and rove out into long soft bands without twist.