92 NEW AFRICA. 



Much of the history of the Nandi and Kavirondo tribes is written 

 in the past tense, as they are among the unfortunate people who are 

 victims of the Sleeping Sickness, which has killed two hundred thousand 

 people in the regions tributary to Lake Victoria Nyanza ; and as no cure 

 has yet been found for the terrible plague the order has gone forth that 

 all tribes inhabiting the infested area shall be removed back into a safe 

 country. The Sleeping Sickness had been especially destructive to the 

 Kavirondo, as the tsetse fly, which produced it, had free access to their 

 naked bodies. 



NATIVE KINGDOM OF UGANDA. 



One of the chief objects in building the Uganda Railroad was 'to 

 tap the rich native kingdom of Uganda west of Lake Victoria Nyanza. 

 It is a well organized state, composed of a union of the most intelligent 

 and progressive of the Baganda tribes. They have well been termed 

 the Japanese of Africa, as they possess a wonderful power of absorbing 

 and practically applying the knowledge derived from European contact. 

 Even before Cameron and Stanley came among them, rumors had 

 reached the outside world of a far-advanced native confederation hold- 

 ing the country between lakes Victoria and Albert Nyanza. But it was 

 not until its last autocratic King was banished by the British and a 

 protectorate assumed that the state was organized along modern lines, 

 although the Catholic and Episcopal missionaries had planted many seeds 

 which had borne good fruit. The territory is now divided into twenty 

 counties, each county ruled by a chief, and the entire state is governed 

 by King Daudi Chwa, who, as he is only about thirteen years of age, 

 is under the guardianship of three regents. The native parliament con- 

 sists of the regents and county chiefs named, sixty Notables (three from 

 each county) and six Persons of Importance, all appointed by the King 

 and subject to the veto of the British government. Besides the estab- 

 lishment of a virtually modern monarchy, Uganda has also made a great 

 advance toward modern standards in the abolishment of the most ob- 

 jectionable features of polygamy — such as the selling of women for 



wives. 



Physically, Uganda is a land of beauties — gorgeous landscape efifects, 

 highly colored birds, enormous moths and butterflies and tropical lux- 

 uriance of vegetation. The soil is wonderfully rich. The country is 

 simply unctuous with bananas. Cotton grows everywhere, and other 



