MASSACRE OF MANY EM A. 493 



The market was attended every fourth day by between two thousand and 

 three thousand people. It was held on a long slope of land, which down at 

 the river ended in a creek capable of containing between fifty and sixty 

 large canoes. The majority of the market people were women, many of them 

 very pretty. The people west of the river brought fish, salt, pepper, oil, 

 grass-cloth, iron, fowls, goats, sheep, pigs, in great numbers, to exchange 

 with those east of the river for cassava grain, potatoes, and other farinaceous 

 products. They have a strong sense of natural justice, and all unite in forcing 

 each other to fair dealing. At first my presence made them all afraid ; but 

 wishing to gain their confidence, which my enemies tried to undermine or 

 prevent, I went among them frequently, and when they saw no harm in me, 

 became very gracious. 



a The bargaining was the finest acting I ever saw. I understood but 



few of the words that flew off the glib tongues of the women, but their gestures 



spoke plainly. I took sketches of the fifteen varieties of fish brought in, to 



compare them with those of the Nile farther down, and all were eager to 



tell their names. But on the date referred to I had left the market only a 



minute or two, when three men whom I had seen with guns, and felt inclined 



to reprove them for bringing them into the market-place, but had refrained, 



attributing it to ignorance in new-comers, began to fire into the dense crowd 



around them ; another party, down at the canoes, rained their balls on the 



panic-struck multitude that rushed into these vessels. All threw away their 



goods; the men forgot their paddles; the canoes were jammed in the creek 



and could not be got out quick enough, so many men and women sprang into 



the water. The women of the left bank are expert divers for oysters, and a 



long line of heads showed a crowd striking out for an island a mile off; to 



gain it, they had to turn the left shoulder against a current of between a 



. mile and a-half to two miles an hour. Had they gone diagonally with the 



current, though that would have been three miles, many would have gained 



the shore. It was horrible # to see one head after another disappear, some 



calmly, others throwing their arms high up towards the Great Father of all, 



and going down. Some of the men who got canoes out of the crowd paddled 



quick, with hands and arms, to help their friends ; three took people in, till 



they all sank together. One man had clearly lost his head, for he paddled 



a canoe which would have held fifty people straight up-stream, nowhere. 



The Arabs estimated the loss at between four hundred and five hundred 



souls. Dugumbe sent out some of his men in one of his thirty canoes, which 



the owners in their fright could not extricate, to save the sinking. One woman 



refused to be taken on board because she thought that she was to be made a 



slave; but he rescued twenty-one, and of his own accord sent them, next day, 



home ; many escaped and came to me, and were returned to their friends. 



When the firing began on the terror-stricken crowd at the canoes, Tagamoio's 



