Chap. XVIII. INSUBOEDINATION SUPPRESSED. 347 



fears expressed by niy people, and threatened to return if pre- 

 sents were not made at once. But my men had never left their 

 own country before, except for rapine and murder. When they 

 formerly came to a village they were in the habit of killing 

 numbers of the inhabitants, and then taking a few young men 

 to serve as guides to the next place. As this was their first 

 attempt at an opposite line of conduct, and as they were without 

 their shields, they felt defenceless among the greedy Chiboque, 

 and some allowance must be made for them on that account. 



Saturday, 11th. — Reached a small village on the banks of a 

 narrow stream. I was too ill to go out of my little covering, 

 except to quell a mutiny which began to show itself among 

 some of the Batoka and Ambonda of our party. They grumbled, 

 as they often do against their chiefs, when they think them 

 partial in their gifts, because they supposed that I had shown 

 a preference in the distribution of the beads ; but the beads I 

 had given to my principal men were only sufficient to purchase 

 a scanty meal, and I had hastened on to this village in order to 

 slaughter a tired ox, and give them all a feast as well as a rest 

 on Sunday, as preparation for the journey before us. I explained 

 this to them, and thought their grumbling was allayed. I soon 

 sank into a state of stupor, which the fever sometimes produced, 

 and was oblivious to all their noise in slaughtering. On Sunday 

 the mutineers were making a terrible din in preparing a skin 

 they had procured. I requested them twice, by the man who 

 attended me, to be more quiet, as the noise pained me : but as 

 they paid no attention to this civil request, I put out my head, 

 and, repeating it myself, was answered by an impudent laugh. 

 Knowing that discipline would be at an end if this mutiny were 

 not quelled, and that our lives depended on vigorously uphold- 

 ing authority, I seized a double-barrelled pistol, and darted forth 

 from the domicile, looking, I suppose, so savage as to put them 

 to a precipitate flight. As some remained within hearing, I 

 told them that I must maintain discipline, though at the expense 

 of some of their limbs ; so long as we travelled together they 

 must remember that I was master, and not they. There being 

 but little room to doubt my determination, they immediately 

 became very obedient, and never afterwards gave me any 

 trouble, or imagined that they had any right to my property. 



