200 



THE LAKE REGIONS OF CENTRAL AFRICA. 



" One, two, three what ? sheep, or goats, or women ? " 

 — expressing the numerals in Kisawahili. 



" By no means, only 1, 2, 3 sheep in thine own tongue, 

 the tongue of the Wapoka." 



"Hi! Hi! what wants the white man with the 

 Wapoka ? " 



And so on till patience was almost impossible. But, 

 like the Irish shay-horse of days gone by, their tongues 

 once started often hobbled on without halting. The 

 tame slaves were more tractable, yet even in their case 

 ten minutes sufficed to weary out the most intellectual ; 

 when the listless and incoherent reply, the glazed eye 

 gazing at vacancy, and the irresistible tendency to gape 

 and yawn, to nod and snooze, evidenced a feeble brain 

 soon overworked. Said Bin Salim would sit staring at 

 me with astonishment, and ejaculate, like Abba Grego- 

 rius, the preceptor of Ludolph, the grammarian philolo- 

 gist and historian of ^Ethiopia, " Yerily in the coast- 

 tongue words never take root, nor do they bear 

 branches." 



The rest of my time was devoted to preparations for 

 journeying. The Fundi's tent, which had accompanied 

 us to Uvira, was provided with an outer cover. The 

 Sepoys " pal," brought from Zanzibar, having been 

 destroyed by the ill-treatment of the villain Kannena, 

 I made up, with the aid of a blackguard Baghdadi, 

 named 'Brahim, a large tent of American domestics, 

 which having, however, but one cloth, and that of the 

 thinnest, proved a fiery purgatory on the down-march 

 eastwards. The canvas lug-sail was provided with an 

 extra double cloth, sewn round the top to increase its 

 dimensions : it thus became a pent-shaped affair, twelve 

 feet long, eight broad, and six feet high — seven would 

 have been better, — buttoned at the foot, which was semi- 

 circular, and in front provided with blue cotton cur- 



