74 UNDER THE AFRICAN SUN 



incessant rains, may be gauged by the huge and lieavy scaffold- 

 ing of the native bridge over the Sio river in Kavirondo. In 

 the dry season it was possible to cross this river by wadin<^ 

 through it. 



The Wakitosh expedition was followed by one against the 

 Wakilelowa. In discussing the plans with chief Mumia, our 

 friendly Kavirondo ally, Mr. Grant made some allusion to 

 probable difficulties if the recent heavy rains were to continue. 

 Mumia pointed to me and said : ** You have got the white 

 medicine-man ; why don't you ask him to give you fine 

 weather?" We explamed that this sort of thing was beyond 

 the province of all white men, whether medicine-man or not. 

 Whereupon Mumia quietly remarked to him, that if we could 

 not do it, his own medicine-man could and would do it at 

 once, provided he were paid. On being asked how much, he 

 said : "one cow." Half in fun he was told that white men do 

 not pay, till they have had proof of such pretensions ; but he 

 accepted this as a verbal agreement, and said: "All right I 

 my medicine-man shall see that you have fine weather." 

 Next morning our expedition started, and by an absurd coinci- 

 dence we did not have a drop of rain, though it had been 

 raining almost daily up till then. We had some lovelv days. 

 Of course Mumia was satisfied that his wizard had performed 

 the trifling feat of securing for us fine weather ; and our 

 leader had naturally to hand over the cow, as non-payment 

 would have been considered as breaking a white man's word. 

 Where the European villain with his lies and frauds has not 

 yet made his appearance, the white man's simple word is equal 

 to a solemn and binding oath. 



It must not be thought, that the native medicine-man has 

 always a pleasant time of it. I inquired of Mumia, how long 

 his medicine-man had been with him, and was told that not 

 many years ago this medicine-man's predecessor was put to 

 death on account of his obstinacy in refusing to provide rain, 

 when the whole nation was suffering from a severe drought. 

 The position of the African medicine -man, though highly 

 honourable and lucrative, is. therefore somewhat precarious. 



The Wakilelowa were, speedily defeated, and the inhabitants 

 of Kabras sued for peace and entered into blood-brotherhood 

 with the civilian in charge of the district. This rite consisted 

 in cutting the throat of a dog, the two contracting parties 



