BANTU NEGROES 713 



The crow opened his eyes and mouth, and just then the hare flung a lot of dust 

 into them, and whilst the crow tried to remove the dust the hare ran away. 



"What shall I do now?" said the crow, when he had finished taking the dust 

 out of his eyes. ' : The leopard will be angry when he finds the hare gone, and I 

 am sure to catch it. Ha ! ha ! I have it. I will gather some ' ntengo ' (poisonous 

 fruit of one of the Solanacece, about the size of a potato apple) and put them into 

 the hare's burrow-hole. When the leopard applies fire to the hole the ' ntengo ' will 

 explode, and the Jeopard will think the hare has burst and died." 



The crow accordingly placed several "ntengo" in the hole, and after some time 

 the leopard arrived. 



"Have you still got him inside?" he asked. 



'' Yes, sir." 



" Has he been saying anything 1 " 



"Not a word." 



"Now then, hare," said the leopard, "when you hear ' zoooooooooooooo,' hold 

 down your head. Do you hear 1 " 



No reply. 



'• You killed all the elephant's messengers, just as you tried to kill me to-day ; 

 but it is all finished now with you. When I say ' zoooooooooooooo ' hang down 

 your head. Ha ! ha ! " 



But the hare meantime was at home, making a hearty meal ofi' the remainder of 

 the elephant steaks. 



The district which bounds Uganda on the east is called Busoga. The 

 boundary is a very definite one ; it is the course of the Victoria Nile 

 from Lake Victoria northwards to the great marshes and backwaters of 

 of Kiosra. According to native tradition this country was formerly 

 inhabited by Nilotic Negroes of the Lango tribe, and also of the interesting 

 Elgumi race — the Elgumi being more allied in language and physique to 

 the Masai. In the extreme east of Busoga also there had taken refuge 

 remnants of one of the earliest of Bantu invasions of Negro Nileland— the 

 Masaba people — a few thousands of whom still dwell on the western flanks 

 and foot-hills of Mount Elgon. Into this country — the lakeward portions 

 of which were but thinly inhabited because of the density of the forests — 

 there broke some hundreds of years ago an invasion of Uganda people, or 

 at any rate of Negroes from the direction of Uganda who spoke a dialect 

 of the Luganda language. These — after mingling with the Lango and 

 Elgumi, and absorbing, perhaps, a dwarfish element akin to the modern 

 Masaba — were the ancestors of the modern Basoga. People of the same 

 general stock and speaking the same dialect also occupied the large island 

 of Buvuma and all the islands along the north coast of the Victoria 

 Nyanza from the vicinity of Uganda to opposite the Samia Hills. It is a 

 point of some interest also to remark that the dialect of Busoga (Lusoga) 

 is more like the speech of the Sese Islands than that of Uganda. Both 

 the Basese and Basoga speak a language which is almost closer to Luganda 



