The park lands of Dut’humi, the jungles and forests of Ugogi and Mgunda Mk’hali, the barrens of Usukuma, and the tangled thickets of Ujiji, are full of noble game,—lions and leopards, elephants and rhinoceroses, wild cattle, giraffes, gnus, zebras, quaggas, and ostriches. But these are dangerous regions where the sportsman often cannot linger for a day. Setting aside the minor considerations of miasma and malaria,—the real or fancied perils of the place, and the want of food, or the difficulty of procuring water, would infallibly cause the porters to desert. Here are no Cape-waggons, at once house, store, and transport; no “Ships of the Desert,” never known to run away; in fact there is no vehicle but man, and he is so impatient and headstrong, so suspicious and timorous, that he must be humoured in every whim. As sportsmen know, it is difficult to combine surveying operations and collection of specimens with a pursuit which requires all a man’s time; in these countries, moreover, no merely hunting-expedition would pay, owing to the extraordinary expense of provisions and carriage. Thus Venator will be reduced to use his “shooting-iron” on halting days, and at the several periods of his journey, and his only consolation will be the prospect of wreaking vengeance upon the hippopotamus and the crocodile of the coast, if his return there be entered in the book of Time. Finally, East Africa wants the vast variety of animals, especially the beautiful antelopes, which enrich the lists of the Cape Fauna. The tale of those observed in short: the horns of the oryx were seen, the hartebeest and steinbok, the saltiana and the pallah,—the latter affording excellent venison,—were shot. The country generally produces the “Suiya,” a little antelope with reddish coat and diminutive horns, about the size of an English hare, the swangura, or sungula, an animal somewhat larger than the saltiana, and of which, according to the people, the hind only has horns; and at K’hutu my companion saw a double-horned antelope which he thought resembled the “Chouka-singa,” (Tetraceros Quadricornis) of Nepaul. The species of birds, also, are scarcely more numerous than the beasts; the feathered tribe is characterised by sombreness of plumage, and their song is noisy but not harmonious, unpleasant, perhaps because strange, to the European ear.

On the 8th October appeared at Kanyenye a large down-caravan headed by Abdullah bin Nasib, a Msawahili of Zanzibar, whose African name is Kisesa. This good man began with the usual token of hospitality, the gift of a goat, and some measures of the fine Unyanyembe rice, of which return-parties carry an ample store: he called upon me at once with several companions,—one of them surprised me not a little by an English “good morning,”—and he kindly volunteered to halt a day whilst we wrote reports and letters, life-certificates, and duplicate-indents upon Zanzibar for extra supplies of drugs and medical comforts, cloth and beads. The asses were now reduced to five, and as Magomba refused to part with any of his few animals, at any price,—on the coast I had been assured that asses were as numerous as dogs in Ugogo—Abdullah gave me one of his riding-animals, and would take nothing for it except a little medicine, and a paper acknowledging his civility. Several of the slaves and porters had been persuaded by the Wagogo to desert, and Abdullah busied himself to recover them. One man, who had suddenly deposited his pack upon the path and had disappeared in the jungle during the noonday halt, was pointed out by a woman to Kidogo, and was found lurking in a neighbouring village, where the people refused to give him up. Abdullah sent for Magomba’s four chief “ministers,” and persuaded them to render active aid: they seized the fellow, took from him his wire and his nine cloths, appropriated four, and left me five wherewith to engage another porter. The deserter was of course dismissed, but the severity of the treatment did not prevent three desertions on the next day.

The 10th October ushered in an ugly march. Emerging betimes from the glaring white and red plains of Kanyenye, dotted with fields, villages, and calabashes, we unloaded in a thin jungle of mimosa and grass-bunches, near sundry pools, then almost dried up, but still surrounded by a straggling growth of chamærops and verdurous thorns. The bush gave every opportunity to the porters, who had dispersed in the halt, to desert with impunity. In our hurried morning tramp, want of carriage had caused considerable confusion, and at 2 P.M., when again the word “load” was given for a tirikeza, everything seemed to go wrong. Said bin Salim and the Jemadar hurried forwards, leaving me to manage the departure with Kidogo, who, whilst my companion lay under a calabash almost unable to move, substituted for his strong Mnyamwezi ass a wretched animal unable to bear the lightest load. The Baloch Belok was asked to carry our only gourd full of water; he pleaded sickness as an excuse. And, when the rear of the caravan was about to march, Kidogo, who alone knew the way, hastened on so fast that he left us to wander through a labyrinth of elephants’ tracks, hedged in by thorns and brambly trees, which did considerable damage to clothes and cutis.

Having at length found the way, we advanced over a broad, open, and grassy plain, striped with southwards-trending sandy water-courses of easy ascent and descent, and lined with a green aromatic vegetation, in which the tall palm suggested a resemblance to the valley-plains of the Usagara Mountains. As night fell upon us like a pall, we entered the broken red ground that limits the flat westwards, and, ascending a dark ridge of broken, stony, ground, and a dense thorn-bush, we found ourselves upon a higher level. The asses stumbled, the men grumbled, and the want of water severely tried the general temper.

From this cold jungle—the thermometer showed a minimum of 54° F.—we emerged at dawn on the 11th October, and after three hours’ driving through a dense bush of various thorns, with calabashes reddened by the intense heat, and tripping upon the narrow broken path that ran over rolling ground, we found the porters halted at some pits full of sweet clear water. Here the caravan preserved a remarkable dead silence. I inquired the cause. The Coast-Arabs who accompanied us were trying an experiment, which, had it failed, would have caused trouble, expense, and waste of time; they were attempting to pass without blackmail the little clearing of Usek’he, which lay to the south of the desert-road, and they knew that its Sultan, Ganza Mikono, usually posted a party upon the low masses of bristling hill hard by, to prevent caravans evading his dues. As no provisions were procurable in the jungle, it was judged better to proceed, and the sun was in the zenith before we reached the district of K’hok’ho. We halted under a spreading tree, near the head-quarter village of its villanous Sultan, in an open plain of millet and panicum-stubbles. Presently Kidogo, disliking the appearance of things—the men, rushing with yells of excitement from their villages, were forming a dense ring around us; the even more unmanageable old women stared like sages femmes, and already a Mnyamwezi porter had been beaten at the well—stirred us up and led the way to an open jungle about a mile distant. There we were safe; no assailant would place himself upon the plain, the Coast-Arabs were close at hand, and in the bush we should have been more than a match for the Wagogo.

The Baloch, fatigued by the tedious marches of the last two days, had surlily refused their escort to our luggage, as well as to ourselves. When the camp was pitched, I ordered a goat to be killed; and, serving out rations to the sons of Ramji and the porters, I gave them none, a cruel punishment to men whose souls centered in their ingesta. The earlier part of the evening was spent by them in enumerating their grievances—they were careful to speak in four dialects, so that all around might understand them, in discussing their plans of desertion, and in silencing the contradiction of their commander, the monocular Jemadar, who, having forsworn opium, now headed the party in opposition to the mutineers. They complained that they were faint for want of meat—the fellows were driving a bullock and half a dozen goats, which they had purchased with cloth, certainly not their own. I had, they grumbled, given them no ghee or honey, consequently they were obliged to “eat dry”—they knew this to be false, as they had received both at Kanyenye. We had made them march ten “Cos” in our eagerness to obtain milk—they were the first to propose reaching a place where provisions were procurable. The unmanageables, Khudabakhsh, Shahdad, and Belok, proposed an immediate departure, but a small majority carried the day in favour of desertion next morning. Kidogo and the sons of Ramji ridiculed, as was their wont, the silly boasters with, “Of a truth, brethren! the coast is far off, and ye are hungry men!” On the ensuing day, when a night’s reflection had cooled down their noble bile, they swallowed their words like buttered parsnips. I heard no more of their plans, and in their demeanour they became cringing as before.

The transit of the K’hok’ho clearing, which is also called the Nyika, or wilderness, is considered the nucleus of travellers’ troubles in Ugogo. The difficulty is caused by its Sultan, M’ana Miaha, popularly known as Maguru Mafupi, or Short-shanks. This petty tyrant, the most powerful, however, of the Wagogo chiefs, is a toothache to strangers, who complain that he cannot even plunder à l’aimable. He was described to me as a short elderly man, nearly bald, chocolate-coloured, and remarkable for the duck-like conformation which gave origin to his nickname. His dress was an Arab check round his loins, and another thrown over his shoulders. He becomes man, idiot, and beast with clockwork-regularity every day; when not disguised in liquor he is surly and unreasonable, and when made merry by his cups he refuses to do business. He is in the habit of detaining Wanyamwezi caravans to hoe his fields, and he often applies them to a corvée of five or six days during the spring-time, before he will consent to receive his blackmail.

We were delayed five days at K’hok’ho to lay in provisions for four marches, and by the usual African pretexts, various and peculiar. On the afternoon of arrival it would have been held indecent haste to trouble His Highness. On the first morning His Highness’s spouse was unwell, and during the day he was “sitting upon Pombe,” in other words, drinking beer. On the second he received, somewhat scurvily, a deputation headed by Said bin Salim, the Coast-Arab merchants, and the Jemadar. Two Wazagira, or chief-councillors, did the palaver, which was conducted, for dignity, outside the royal hovel. He declared that the two caravans must compound separately, and that in my case he would be satisfied with nothing under six porters’ loads. As about one-twelfth of his demand was offered to him, he dismissed them with ignominy, affirming that he held me equal to the Sayyid of Zanzibar, and accordingly that he should demand half the outfit. The third day was spent by the Coast-Arabs in haggling with the courtiers before His Highness, who maintained a solemn silence, certainly the easiest plan; and the present was paraded, as is customary on such occasions, in separate heaps, each intended for a particular person, but Her Highness, justly offended by the flimsiness of a bit of chintz, seized a huge wooden ladle and hooted and hunted the offenders out of doors. After high words the Arabs returned, and informed me that things were looking desperate. I promised assistance in case of violence being offered to them,—a civility which they acknowledged by sending a shoulder of beef. The fourth day was one of dignified idleness. We received a message that the court was again sitting upon Pombe, and we too well understood that His Highness, with his spouse and cabinet, were drunk as drunk could be. On the morning of the fifth day, a similar delaying process was attempted; but as the testy Kidogo, who had taken the place of the tame Said, declared that the morrow should see us march in the afternoon, the present was accepted, and the two or three musket shots usual on such occasions sounded the joyful tidings that we were at liberty to proceed. The unconscionable extortioner had received one coil of brass wire, four “cloths with names,” eight domestics, eight blue cottons, and thirty strings of coral beads. Not contented with this, he demanded two Arab checks, and these failing, a double quantity of beads, and another domestic. I compromised the affair with six feet of crimson broadcloth, an article which I had not produced, as the Coast-Arabs, who owned none, declared that such an offering would cause difficulties in their case. But as they charged me double and treble prices for the expensive cloths which the Sultan required, and which, as they had been omitted in our outfit, it was necessary to purchase from them, I at length thought myself justified in economising by the only means in my power. The fiery-tempered Coast-Arabs left K’hok’ho with rage in their hearts and curses under their tongues. These men usually think outside their heads, but they know that in Ugogo the merest pretext—the loosing a hot word, touching a woman, offending a boy, or taking in vain the name of the Sultan—infallibly leads to being mulcted in cloth.

I was delighted to escape from the foul strip of crowded jungle in which we had halted. A down-caravan of Wanyamwezi had added its quotum of discomfort to the place. Throughout the fiery day we were stung by the Tzetze, and annoyed by swarms of bees and pertinacious gadflies. On one occasion an army of large poisonous siyafu, or black pismire, drove us out of the tent by the wounds which it inflicted between the fingers and on other tender parts of the body, before a kettle of boiling water persuaded them to abandon us. These ant-fiends made the thin-skinned asses mad with torture. The nights were cold and raw, and when we awoke in the morning we found some valuable article rendered unserviceable by the termites. K’hok’ho was an ill-omened spot. There my ass “Seringe,” sole survoice of the riding animals brought from Zanzibar, was so torn by a hyæna that I was compelled to leave it behind. I was afterwards informed that it had soon died of its wounds. The next mishap was the desertion of the fifteen Wanyamwezi porters who had been hired and paid at Ugogi. These men had slept in the same kraal with the somnolent sons of Ramji, and had stealthily disappeared during the night. As usual, though they carried off their own, they had left our loads behind, that they might reach their homes with greater speed. They would choose a jungle road, to avoid the danger of slavery, and living the while upon roots and edible grasses, would traverse the desert separating them from their country in three or four days. This desertion of fifteen men first suggested to me that my weary efforts and wearing anxiety about carriage were to a certain extent self-inflictions. Expecting to see half the outfit left upon the ground, I was surprised by the readiness with which it disappeared. The men seemed to behave best whenever things were palpably at the worst; besides which, as easily as the baggage of 50 porters was distributed amongst 100, so easily were the loads of 100 men placed upon the shoulders of 50. Indeed, the original Wanyamwezi gang, who claimed by right extra pay for carrying extra weight, though fiercely opposed to lifting up an empty gourd gratis, were ever docile when a heavier pack brought with it an increase of cloth and beads.

However, the march on the 17th October had its trifling hardships. My companion rode forward on the ass lately given to us by Abdullah bin Nasib, whilst I, remaining behind and finding that no carriage could be procured for two bags of clothes and shoes, placed them upon my animal the Mnyamwezi bought at Inenge, inasmuch as it appeared somewhat stronger than the half-dozen wretched brutes that flung themselves upon the ground apparently too fagged to move. I had, however, overrated its powers: it soon became evident that I must walk, or that the valuable cargo must be left behind. Trembling with weakness, I set out to traverse the length of the Mdáburu Jungle. The memory of that march is not pleasant: the burning sun and the fiery reflected heat arising from the parched ground—here a rough, thorny, and waterless jungle, where the jasmine flowered and the frankincense was used for fuel; there a grassy plain of black and sun-cracked earth—compelled me to lie down every half-hour. The watergourds were soon drained by my attendant Baloch; and the sons of Ramji, who, after reaching the resting-place, had returned with ample stores for their comrades, hid their vessels on my approach. Sarmalla, a donkey-driver, the model of a surly negro, whose crumpled brow, tightened eyes and thick lips which shot-out on the least occasion of excitement, showed what was going on within his head, openly refused me the use of his gourd, and—thirst is even less to be trifled with than hunger—found ample reason to repent himself of the proceeding. Near the end of the jungle I came upon a party of the Baloch, who, having seized upon a porter belonging to a large caravan of Wanyamwezi that had passed us on that march, were persuading him, half by promises and half by threats, to carry their sleeping mats and their empty gourds. The strict and positive orders as regards enticing away deserters which I had issued at Inenge, were looked upon by them, in their all-engrossing egotism, as a mere string of empty words. I could do nothing beyond threatening to report their conduct to their master, and dismissing the man, who obviously stood in fear of death, with his tobacco and hoes duly counted back to him. Towards the end of that long march I saw with pleasure the kindly face of Seedy Bombay, who was returning to me in hot haste, leading an ass, and carrying a few scones and hard-boiled eggs. Mounting, I resumed my way, and presently arrived at the confines of Mdáburu, where, under a huge calabash, stood our tent, amidst a kraal of grass boothies, surrounded by a heaped-up ridge of thorns.

Mdáburu is the first important district in the land of Uyanzi, which, beginning from Western K’hok’ho, extends as far as Tura, the eastern frontier of Unyamwezi-land. It is a fertile depression of brick-red earth, bisected by a broad, deep, and sandy Fiumara, which, trending southwards, supplies from five pits water in plenty even during the driest season. It is belted on all sides by a dense jungle, over whose dark brown line appeared the summits of low blue cones, and beyond them long streaks of azure ridge, beautified by distance into the semblance of a sea. We were delayed two days at this, the fourth and westernmost district of Ugogo. It was necessary to lay in a week’s provision for the party—ever a tedious task in these regions, but more especially in the dead of winter—moreover, the Sultan Kibuya expected the settlement of his blackmail. From this man we experienced less than the usual incivility: by birth a Mkimbu foreigner, and fearing at that time wars and rumours of wars on the part of his villanous neighbour, Maguru Mafupi, he contented himself with a present which may be estimated at nineteen cloths, whereas the others had murmured at forty and fifty. However, he abated nothing of his country’s pretentious pride. A black, elderly man, dressed in a grimy cloth, without other ornament but a broad ivory bracelet covering several inches of his right wrist, he at first refused to receive the deputation because his “ministers” were absent; and during the discourse about the amount of blackmail, he sat preserving an apathetic silence, outside his dirty lodging in the huge kraal which forms his capital. The demand concluded with a fine silk-cotton cloth, on the part of his wife; and when “ma femme” appears on such occasions in these regions, as in others further west, it is a sure sign that the stranger is to be taken in. As usual with the East African chiefs, Kibuya was anxious to detain me, not only in order that his people might profitably dispose of their surplus stores, but also because the presence of so many guns would go far to modify the plans of his enemies. His attempts at delay, however, were skilfully out-manœuvred by Said bin Salim, who broke through all difficulties with the hardihood of fear. The little man’s vain terrors made him put the ragged kraal which surrounded us into a condition of defence, and every night he might be seen stalking like a troubled spirit amongst the forms of sleeping men.

At Mdáburu I hired two porters from the caravan that accompanied us; and Said bin Salim began somewhat tardily to take the usual precautions against desertion. He was ordered, before the disappearance of the porters that levanted at K’hok’ho, to pack their hire in our loads, and every evening to chain up the luggage heaped in front of our tent. The accident caused by his neglect rendered him now quasi-obedient. Moreover, two or three Baloch were told off to precede the line, and as many to bring up the rear. The porters, as I have said, hold it a point of honour not to steal their packs; but if allowed to straggle forwards, or to loiter behind, they will readily attempt the recovery of their goods by opening their burdens, which they afterwards abandon upon the road. The Coast-Arabs, in return for some small shot, which is here highly prized, assisted me by carrying some surplus luggage. Amongst other articles, two kegs of gunpowder were committed to them: both were punctually returned at Unyanyembe, where gunpowder sells at two cloths, or half a Frasilah (17·5 lbs.) of ivory per lb; but the bungs had been stove in, and a quarter of the contents had evaporated. The evening of the second day’s halt closed on us before the rations for the caravan were collected, and seventeen shukkah, with about a hundred strings of beads, barely produced a sufficiency of grain.

From the Red Vale of Mdáburu three main lines traverse the desert between Ugogo and Unyamwezi. The northernmost, called Njia T’humbi, leads in a west-north-westerly direction to Usukuma. Upon this track are two sultans and several villages. The central “Karangásá,” or “Mdáburu,” is that which will be described in the following pages. The southernmost, termed Uyánzi, sets out from K’hok’ho, and passes through the settlements known by the name of Jiwe lá Singá. It is avoided by the porters, dreading to incur the wrath of Sultan Kibuyá, who would resent their omitting to visit his settlement, M’dáburu.

These three routes pass through the heart of the great desert and elephant-ground “Mgunda Mk’hali”—explained by the Arabs to mean in Kinyamwezi, the Fiery “Shamba” or Field. Like Marenga Mk’hali, it is a desert, because it contains no running water nor wells, except after rain. The name is still infamous, but its ill-fame rests rather upon tradition than actuality; in fact, its dimensions are rapidly shrinking before the torch and axe. About fifteen years ago it contained twelve long stages, and several tirikeza; now it is spanned in eight marches. The wildest part is the first half from Mdáburu to Jiwe lá Mkoa, and even here, it is reported, villages of Wakimbu are rising rapidly on the north and south of the road. The traveller, though invariably threatened with drought and the death of cattle, will undergo little hardship beyond the fatigue of the first three forced marches through the “Fiery Field;” in fact, he will be agreeably surprised by its contrast with the desert of Marenga Mk’hali.

From east to west the diagonal breadth of Mgunda Mk’hali is 140 miles. The general aspect is a dull uniform bush, emerald-coloured during the rains, and in the heats a network of dry and broom-like twigs. Except upon the banks of nullahs—“rivers” that are not rivers—the trees, as in Ugogo, wanting nutriment, never afford timber, and even the calabash appears stunted. The trackless waste of scrub, called the “bush” in Southern Africa, is found in places alternating with thin gum-forest; the change may be accounted for by the different depths of water below the level of the ground. It is a hardy vegetation of mimosas and gums mixed with evergreen succulent plants, cactaceæ, aloes, and euphorbias: the grass, sometimes tufty, at other times equally spread, is hard and stiff; when green it feeds cattle, and when dry it is burned in places by passing caravans to promote the growth of another crop.

The groundwork of Mgunda Mk’hali is a detritus of yellowish quartz, in places white with powdered felspar, and, where vegetation decays, brown-black with humus. Water-worn pebbles are sprinkled over the earth, and the vicinity of Fiumaras abounds in a coarse and modern sandstone-conglomerate. Upon the rolling surface, and towering high above the tallest trees, are based the huge granitic and syenitic outcrops before alluded to. The contrast between the masses and the dwarf rises which support them at once attracts the eye. Here and there the long waves that diversify the land appear in the far distance like blue lines bounding the nearer superficies of brown or green. Throughout this rolling table-land the watershed is to the south. In rare places the rains stagnate in shallow pools, which become systems of mud-cakes during the drought. At this season water is often unprocurable in the Fiumaras, causing unaccustomed hardships to caravans, and death to those beasts which, like the elephant and the buffalo, cannot long exist without drinking.

On the 20th October we began the transit of the “Fiery Field,” whose long broad line of brown jungle, painted blue by the intervening air, had, since leaving K’hok’ho, formed our western horizon. The waste here appeared in its most horrid phase. The narrow goat-path serpentined in and out of a growth of poisonous thorny jungle, with thin, hard grass-straw, growing on a glaring white and rolling ground; the view was limited by bush and brake, as in the alluvial valleys of the maritime region, and in weary sameness the spectacle surpassed everything that we had endured in Marenga Mk’hali. We halted through the heat of the day at some water-pits in a broken course; and resuming our tedious march early in the afternoon, we arrived about sunset at the bed of a shallow nullah, where the pure element was found in sand-holes about five feet deep.

On the 2nd day we reached the large Mabunguru Fiumara, a deep and tortuous gash of fine yellow quartzoze sand and sunburnt blocks of syenite: at times it must form an impassable torrent, even at this season of severe drought it afforded long pools of infiltrated rain-water, green with weeds and abounding with shell-fish, and with the usual description of Silurus. In the earlier morning the path passed through a forest already beautified by the sprouting of tender green leaves and by the blooming of flowers, amongst which was a large and strongly perfumed species of jasmine, whilst young grass sprouted from the fire-blackened remnants of the last year’s crop. Far upon the southern horizon rose distant hills and lines, blue, as if composed of solidified air, and mocking us by their mirage-likeness to the ocean. Nearer, the ground was diversified by those curious evidences of igneous action, which extend westward through eastern Unyamwezi, and northwards to the shores of the Nyanza Lake. These outcrops of gray granite and syenite are principally of two different shapes, the hog’s back and the turret. The former usually appears as a low lumpy dome of various dimensions; here a few feet long, there extending a mile and a half in diameter: the outer coat scales off under the action of the atmosphere, and in places it is worn away by a network of paths. The turret is a more picturesque and changing feature. Tall rounded blocks and conical or cylindrical boulders, here single, there in piles or ridges, some straight and stiff as giant ninepins, others split as if an alley or a gateway passed between them, rise abruptly and perpendicularly almost without foundationary elevation, cleaving the mould of a dead plain, or—like gypseous formations, in which the highest boulders are planted upon the lowest and broadest bases—they bristle upon a wave of dwarfish rocky hill. One when struck was observed to give forth a metallic clink, and not a few, balanced upon points, reminded me of the tradition-bearing rocking stones. At a distance in the forest, the larger masses might be mistaken for Cyclopean walls, towers, steeples, minarets, loggans, dwelling houses, and ruined castles. They are often overgrown with a soft grass, which decaying, forms with the degradation of the granite a thin cap of soil; their summits are crowned with tufty cactus, a stomatiferous plant which imbibes nourishment from the oxygen of the air; whilst huge creepers, imitating trees, project gnarled trunks from the deeper crevices in their flanks. Seen through the forest these rocks are an effective feature in the landscape, especially when the sunbeams fall warm and bright upon their rounded summits and their smooth sides, here clothed with a mildew-like lichen of the tenderest leek-green, there yellowed like Italian marbles by the burning rays, and there streaked with a shining black as if glazed by the rain, which, collecting in cupfuls upon the steps and slopes, at times overflows, coursing in mimic cataracts down the heights.

That march was a severe trial; we had started at dawn, we did not, however, arrive at the Mabunguru Fiumara before noon, and our people straggled in about eveningtide. All our bullet-moulds, and three boxes of ammunition, were lost. Said bin Salim, the Jemadar, and three other men had followed in the rear, driving on the “One-Eyed Fiend,” which, after many a prank, lay down upon the ground, and positively declined to move. The escort, disliking the sun, abandoned it at once to its fate, and want of provisions, and the inordinate length of the marches, rendered a halt or a return for the valuable load—four boxes of ammunition—out of the question. An article once abandoned in these deserts is rarely if ever recovered; the caravan-porters will not halt, and a small party dares not return to recover it.

The 22nd October saw us at Jiwe la Mkoa, the half-way-house of Mgunda Mk’hali. The track, crossing the rough Mabunguru Fiumara, passed over rolling ground through a thorny jungle that gradually thinned out into a forest; about 8 A.M. a halt was called at a water in the wilderness. My companion being no longer able to advance on foot, an ass was unloaded, and its burden of ammunition was divided, for facility of porterage, amongst the sons of Ramji. After noon we resumed our march, and the Kirangozi, derided by the rival guide of the Coast-Arabs’ caravan, and urged forward by Kidogo, who was burning to see his wife and children in Unyamwezi, determined to “put himself at the head of himself.” The jungle seemed interminable. The shadows of the hills lengthened out upon the plains, the sun sank in the glory of purple, crimson, and gold, and the crescent-moon rained a flood of silvery light upon the topmost twig-work of the trees; we passed a dwarf clearing, where lodging and perhaps provisions were to be obtained, and we sped by water near the road where the frogs were chanting their vesper-hymn; still far,—far ahead we heard the horns and the faint march-cries of the porters. At length, towards the end of the march, we wound round a fantastic mass of cactus-clad boulders, and crossing a low ridge we found at its base a single Tembe or square village of emigrant Wakimbu, who refused to admit us. The little basin beyond it displayed, by “black jacks” and felled tree-trunks, evidences of modern industry, and it extended to the Jiwe or Rock, which gives its name to the clearing. We were cheered by the sight of the red fires glaring in the Kraal, but my companion’s ass, probably frightened by some wild beast to us invisible, reared high in the air, bucked like a deer, broke his frail Arab girths, and threw his invalid rider heavily upon the hard earth. Arrived at the Kraal, I found every boothy occupied by the porters, who refused shelter until dragged out like slaughtered sheep. Said bin Salim’s awning was as usual snugly pitched; ours still lay on the ground. The little Arab’s “duty to himself” appeared to attain a higher limit every stage; once comfortably housed, he never thought of offering cover to another, and his children knew him too well even to volunteer such a service to any one but himself. On a late occasion, when our tent had not appeared, Said bin Salim, to whom a message had been sent, refused to lend us one half of the awning committed to him, a piece of canvas cut out to serve as a tent and lug-sail. Bombay then distinguished himself by the memorable words,—“If you are not ashamed of your master, be ashamed of his servant!” which had the effect of bringing the awning and of making Said bin Salim testily refuse the half returned to him.

Jiwe la Mkoa, or the Round Rock, is the largest of the many hogs’-backs of grey syenite that stud this waste. It measures about two miles in extreme diameter, and the dome rises with a gentle slope to the height of 200 or 300 feet above the dead level of the plain. Tolerable water is found in pits upon a swamp at its southern base, and well covered Mtego or elephant traps, deep grave-like excavations, like the Indian “Ogi,” prove dangerous to travellers; in one of these the Jemadar disappeared suddenly, as if by magic. The smooth and rounded surface of the rock displays deep hoof-shaped holes, which in a Moslem land would at once be recognised as the Asr, or the footprints of those holy quadrupeds, Duldul or Zu’l Jenah. In places the Jiwe, overgrown with scattered tufts of white grass, and based upon a dusty surface blackened by torrent rains, forcibly suggested to the Baloch the idea of an elderly negro’s purbald poll.

We encamped close to the Jiwe, and in so doing we did wrong: however pleasant may be the shadow of a tall rock in a thirsty land by day, way-wise travellers avoid the vicinity of stones which, by diminished radiation, retain their heat throughout the night. All caravans passing through this clearing clamour to be supplied with provisions; our porters, who, having received rations for eight days, which they consumed in four, were no exceptions to the rule. As the single little village of Jiwe la Mkoa could afford but one goatskin of grain and a few fowls, the cattle not being for sale, and no calves having been born to the herds, the porters proposed to send a party with cloth and beads to collect provaunt from the neighbouring settlements. But the notable Khalfan bin Khamis, the most energetic of the Coast-Arabs in whose company we were travelling, would brook no delay: he had issued as usual three days’ rations for a long week’s march, and thus by driving his porters beyond their speed, he practised a style of economy usually categorised by us at home as “penny-wise and pound-foolish.” His marching was conducted upon the same principle; determining to save time, he pushed on till his men began to flag, presently broke down, and finally deserted.

At Jiwe la Mkoa the neck of the desert is broken: the western portion of Mgunda Mk’hali has already thinned out. On the 23rd October, despite the long march of the preceding day, Khalfan proposed a Tirikeza, declaring that the heavy nimbus from the west, accompanied by a pleasant cold, portended rain, and that this rain, like the “Choti Barsat” of India, announces the approach of the great Masika, or vernal wet season. Yielding to his reasons, we crossed the “Round Rock,” and passing through an open forest of tall trees, with here and there an undulating break, now yellow with quartz, then black with humus, we reached, after about three hours, another clearing like Jiwe la Mkoa, which owes its origin to the requirements of commerce. “Kirurumo” boasted of several newly built Tembe of Wakimbu, who supplied caravans at an exorbitant rate. The blackness of the ground, and the vivid green of vegetation, evidenced the proximity of water. The potable element was found in pits, sunk in a narrow nullah running northwards across the clearing; it was muddy and abundant. On the next day the road led through a thin forest of thorns and gums, which, bare of bush and underwood, afforded a broad path and pleasant, easy travelling. Sign of elephant and rhinoceros, giraffe and antelope, crossed the path, and as usual in such places, the asses were tormented by the Tzetze. After travelling four hours and thirty minutes, we reached a new settlement upon the western frontier of Uganzi, called “Jiweni,” “near the stones,” from the heaps of block and boulder scattered round pits of good water, sunk about three feet in the ground. The Mongo Nullah, a deep surface-drain, bisects this clearing, which is palpably modern. Many of the trees are barked previous to felling, and others have fallen prostrate, apparently from the depredations of the white ant. On the 25th, after another desert march of 2 hrs. 20′ through a flat country, where the forest was somewhat deformed by bush and brake, which in places narrowed the path to a mere goat-track, we arrived at the third quarter of Mgunda Mk’hali. “Mgongo T’hembo,” or the Elephant’s Back, derives its name from a long narrow ridge of chocolate-coloured syenite, outcropping from the low forest lands around it; the crest of the chain is composed of loose rocks and large detached boulders. Like the other inhabited portions of Mgunda Mk’hali, it is a recent clearing; numerous “black-jacks,” felled trees, and pollarded stumps still cumber the fields. The “Elephant’s Back” is, however, more extensive and better cultivated than any of its neighbours,—Mdáburu alone excepted,—and water being abundant and near the surface, it supports an increasing population of mixed Wakimbu and Wataturu, who dwell in large substantial Tembe, and live by selling their surplus holcus, maize, and fowls to travellers. They do not, like the Wakimbu of Jiwe la Mkoa, refuse entrance to their villages, but they receive the stranger with the usual niggard guest-rites of the slave-path, and African-like, they think only of what is to be gained by hospitality. Here I halted for a day to recruit and to lay in rations. The length of the stages had told upon the men; Bombay had stumped himself, several of the sons of Ramji, and two of Said bin Salim’s children were unable to walk; the asses, throwing themselves upon the ground, required to be raised with the stick, and all preferred rest even to food. Mboni, one of the sons of Ramji, carried off a slave girl from the camp of the Coast-Arabs; her proprietor came armed to recover her, swords were drawn, a prodigious clash and clatter of tongue arose, friends interfered, and blades were sheathed. Khalfan bin Khamis, losing all patience at this delay, bade us adieu, promising to announce our approach at Unyanyembe; about a week afterwards, however, we found him in most melancholy plight, halted half-way, because his over-worked porters had taken “French leave.”

We resumed our march on the 27th October, and after a slow and painful progress for seven hours over a rolling country, whose soil was now yellow with argile, then white with felspar, then black-brown with humus, through thorny bush, and forest here opening out, there densely closing in, we arrived at the “Tura Nullah,” the deepest of the many surface drains winding tortuously to the S. W. The trees lining the margin were of the noblest dimensions; the tall thick grass that hedged them in showed signs of extensive conflagration, and water was found in shallow pools and in deep pits beneath the banks, on the side to which the stream, which must be furious during the rainy season, swings. When halted in a clear place in the jungle, we were passed by a down caravan of Wanyamwezi; our porters shouted and rushed up to greet their friends, the men raised their right hands about a dozen times, and then clapped palm to palm, and the women indulged in “vigelegele,” the African “lulliloo,” which rang like breech-loaders in our ears.

On the next day we set out betimes through the forest, which, as usual when nearing populous settlements, spread out, and which began at this season to show a preponderance of green over brown. Presently we reached a large expanse of yellow stover where the van had halted, in order that the caravan might make its first appearance with dignity. Ensued a clearing, studded with large stockaded villages, peering over tall hedges of dark green milk-bush, fields of maize and millet, manioc, gourds, and water-melons, and showing numerous flocks and herds, clustering around the shallow pits. The people swarmed from their abodes, young and old hustling one another for a better stare; the man forsook his loom and the girl her hoe, and for the remainder of the march we were escorted by a tail of screaming boys and shouting adults; the males almost nude, the women, bare to the waist and clothed only knee-deep in kilts, accompanied us, puffing pipes the while, with wallets of withered or flabby flesh flapping the air, striking their hoes with stones, crying “Beads! beads!” and ejaculating their wonder in strident explosions of “Hi! hi!—Hui! ih!” and “Ha!—a!—a!” It was a spectacle to make an anchorite of a man,—it was at once ludicrous and disgusting.

At length the Kirangozi fluttered his red flag in the wind, and the drums, horns, and larynxes of his followers began the fearful uproar which introduces a caravan to the admiring “natives.” Leading the way, our guide, much to my surprise,—I knew not then that such was the immemorial custom of Unyamwezi,—entered uninvited and sans ceremony the nearest large village; the long string of porters flocked in with bag and baggage, and we followed their example. The guests at once dispersed themselves through the several courts and compounds into which the interior hollow was divided, and lodged themselves with as much regard for self and disregard for their grumbling hosts as possible. We were placed under a wall-less roof, bounded on one side by the bars of the village palisade, and the mob of starers that relieved one another from morning till night made me feel like the denizen of a menagerie.