Chap. IX. EESULTS OF NO GOVEKNMENT. 201 



seated at him by one of the trio. In an instant the gun was 

 out of the rascal's hands, a rattling shower of blows fell on 

 his back, and he took an involuntary header into the river. He 

 crawled up the bank a sad and sober man, and all three at once 

 tumbled from the height of saucy swagger to a low depth of 

 slavish abjectness. The musket was found to have an enormous 

 charge, and might have blown our man to pieces, but for the 

 promptitude with which his companions administered justice 

 in a lawless land. We were all ferried safely across by 

 8 o'clock in the evening. 



In illustration of what takes place where no govern- 

 ment, or law exists, the two half-castes, to whom these men 

 belonged, left Tette, with four hundred slaves, armed with 

 the old Sepoy Brown Bess, to hunt elephants and trade 

 in ivory. On our way up, we heard from natives of their 

 lawless deeds, and again, on our way down, from several, 

 who had been eyewitnesses of the principal crime, and all 

 reports substantially agreed. The story is a sad one. After 

 the traders reached Zumbo, one of them, called by the natives 

 Sequasha, entered into a plot with the disaffected headman, 

 Namakusuru, to kill his Chief, Mpangwe, in order that Narna- 

 kusuru might seize upon the chieftainship ; and for the murder 

 of Mpangwe, the trader agreed to receive ten large tusks of 

 ivory. Sequasha, with a picked party of armed slaves, went 

 to visit Mpangwe, who received him kindly, and treated him 

 with all the honour and hospitality usually shown to distin- 

 guished strangers, and the women busied themselves in cook- 

 ing the best of their provisions for the repast to be set before 

 him. Of this, and also of the beer, the half-caste partook 

 heartily. Mpangwe was then asked by Sequasha to allow his 

 men to fire their guns in amusement. Innocent of any suspi- 

 cion of treachery, and anxious to hear the report of firearms, 



