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about two dozen pebbles in hand, and the play is in shifting the pebbles from one hole to another. Stanley calls the game an
African " back­gammon," and speaks of the board as a "backgam­mon" tray. The word "mun-gala" is of Ara­bic origin, de­rived from " nagal," "to carry from one place to an­other." There is no apparent interest in the game to the
ordinary white man's eye, but native players in the compounds and African negroes generally will keep on moving the little stones for hours at a time with evident satisfaction, taking up their opponents' pebbles, as certain combinations occur, until