LETTERS FROM HOME 



171 



the bales of stuff lay open to dry, as it had rained a great 

 deal in Taveta, as well as with us. Maktubu had returned to 

 camp the day before from his trip of some days' duration to 

 Mombasa to fetch our belongings, but Sehaongwe was still away. 

 Nothing had been forgotten or neglected; but, on the other hand, 

 eighteen men had run away, fourteen taking their weapons with 

 them. On the march to the coast Maktubu's caravan had been 

 attacked by some men sent against him by a certain Mbaruk, 

 who was a descendant of that Mbaruk bin Achmet of the Msara 

 dynasty who had been deprived of his territory by Sultan 

 Seyid Seyid. Like his fathers before him, the present Mbaruk 

 waged war in every possible way upon the Sultan of Zanzibar ; 

 but he always got the worst of it, and, reduced to great straits, 

 he had now long wandered, homeless, with a few followers, in 

 the inaccessible fastnesses of the Hinterland of Mombasa, which 

 had once belonged to his family. The only way left for him to 

 show his spite against the ruler of Zanzibar was to fall on weak 

 caravans led by Arabs. He had thought he had such an one to 

 deal with now, but finding his mistake, he was full of contrition, 

 and offered to make all the amends in his power by taking care 

 of one of our men, Johar by name, who had been seriously 

 wounded in the affray, until he was quite well again. 



A pleasanter surprise was the arrival of a packet of letters 

 from home, sent on by our Consul, Mr. Oswald. Of course every- 

 thing else was put aside to read them, and it was now with the 

 greatest impatience that we had to respond to the perpetual 

 'Yambos,' &c. 



The long rainy season, known as the ?nassika, was now 

 nearly at an end. It began on April 13, and lasted till May 16, 

 but there had only been twenty-one days of absolutely uninter- 

 mittent rain. The fine days occurred at the beginning and 

 towards the end of this period, and were characterised by 

 occasional violent showers. Between-whiles the rain poured 



