Like the zealous listeners of tales in a coffeehouse who, inspired by a divisive and deceitful insolence, suddenly and for no reason at all become enemies of one another and transform the place into a warriors’ battleground, the jereed-players divided themselves into two teams according to their pretended preference for cabbage or okra and stood ready with their breast-beating jereeds. Goaded by the shouts of stern-voiced sergeants, their patience and calm were snatched away and the two sides laid into one another. The jereeds hurled from both sides flew through the air like shooting stars. They feigned to assault one another as if intending to tear each other down with the hook of the hand and to break, like an elephant snapping a dry twig, the canes of each other’s bony fortresses. The jereeds flew back and forth like weavers’ shuttles, now this way, now that. Like the warp and weft of a striped cloth, the two sides became enmeshed in a melee. When the striking with jereeds reached the temper of fighting with iron, the sergeants parted them, uttering soothing sounds and the issue of which side had won this battle of sticks was left to be decided at some other time.