226 



THE RAINS. 



compelled to leave Euga after two niglits, with- 

 out a single observation : even the sun of S. lat. 

 6° could not disperse the dense raw vapours that 

 rose from the steamy ground. I feared to linger 

 longer in Usumbara. We daily expected the 

 ine^dtahle ' seasoning fever,' the rains would make 

 the lowland a hot-bed of disease, and our men 

 were not clad to resist the cold — 73° (F.) at 4 p.m., 

 whilst upon the plains the mercury ranged be- 

 tween 81° and 99°. In the dry monsoon this 

 route might be made practicable to Chaga and 

 KiKma-njaro, both of which have been proposed 

 in the Anglo-Indian papers as Sanitaria. With 

 an escort of a hundred musketeers, and at an 

 expense of £500, the invalid who desu^es to try 

 this African Switzerland may, if perfectly sound 

 in wind, limb, and digestion, reach, despite all 

 the Wamasai, the snowy region, after 10 moun- 

 tain-marches, which should not occupy more 

 than a month. The next century will see these 

 conditions changed. 



Finding it impossible to push farther into 

 Usumbara, we applied ourselves to gathering gen- 

 eral information. Sultan Kimwcre, I was told, is 

 the fourth of a dynasty of Tondeurs and Ecor- 

 cheurs originally from Ngu or Nguru, a hilly 

 region to the West and South of the Upper 



