MARCHING WITHOUT GUIDES. 309 
The Gumba were very friendly, but disappointed me very 
much in their tales of the country ahead. I tried many 
times to get information about tribes living to the north, 
but the Gumba emphatically denied the existence of any 
human beings in that direction, and they refused to give 
me a guide, as they said no one of their people had ever 
followed up the river. ‘There were nothing but dense 
forests and deep marshes.’ The plain through which the 
river passes assumes here the aspect of a valley, which 
becomes more and more hemmed in toward the north by 
the Aro Mountains on one side, and by a chain of moun- 
tains about four thousand feet high on the west. 
“Fly 27. his has been a day of toil for us. The 
Gumba gave us no guides, and only laughed at us when 
we started at sunrise for the North. After going about 
half a mile we found ourselves in a marsh, and gradually 
getting beyond our waists in the water, so that we had to 
return nearly to the Gumba and make a large detour to 
get on the other side of the water. We soon struck a trail 
that led through the dense bush to an old deserted corn- 
field belonging to the Gumba, but could not get beyond 
this, and were obliged to retrace our steps half a mile 
and then find another path that led to the river. We then 
passed along through a tall dark forest, until we again 
came to amarsh and were obliged to go back over our 
road again. There was now no path at all, but it was 
necessary to simply force our way through bushes and 
over marshes and all kinds of bad country that would not 
let us accomplish a mile an hour. 
“ At noon we came to the river, filled the two water-bar- 
eases. Among the Abyssinians venereal diseases are rampant, but after leaving 
Ginea I saw scarcely any evidences of these diseases among the many tribes | 
visited until I reached Gumba. All the Gumba people practice circumcision, 
differing in this respect from the Kere people, only about a third of whom are 
circumcised. 
