MALICE OF UP-CARAVA1S T S. 



179 



provisions are required. On the first, Kidogo would bring 

 about sixty pounds of grain ; on the second, he would 

 disperse his men throughout the villages, and procure the 

 300 pounds required for five marches ; and on the third, 

 he would cause it to be husked and pounded, so as to be 

 ready for the morrow. Three up-caravans, containing a 

 total of about 1 50 men, suffering severely from small-pox, 

 here passed us. One was commanded by Khalfan bin 

 Muallim Salim and his brother Id, coast Arabs, whom 

 we afterwards met at two places. He told me seve- 

 ral deliberate falsehoods about the twenty-two porters 

 that were to follow us, for instance, that he had left 

 them, halted by disease, at Kidunda, in the maritime 

 region, under the command of one Abdullah bin 

 Jumah, and thus he led me to expect them at a time 

 when they had not even been engaged. He and his men 

 also spread reports in Ugogo and other places where 

 the people are peculiarly suspicious concerning the 

 magical and malignant powers of the "whites ; " in fact, 

 he showed all the bad spirit of his bastard blood . At 

 Muhama, the furthest point westward to which the 

 vuli or autumnal rains extend, the climate was still 

 that of the Rufuta Range, foggy, misty mornings, white 

 rags of cloudbank from the table-cloths outspread upon 

 the heights, clear days, with hot suns and chilling south 

 winds, and raw dewy nights. I again suffered from fever ; 

 the attack, after lasting seven clays, disappeared, leaving, 

 however, hepatic complications, which having lasted un- 

 interruptedly ten months, either wore themselves out, 

 or yielded to the action of acids, narcotics, and stimu- 

 lants tardily forwarded from Zanzibar. Here also over- 

 fatigue, in a fruitless shooting-excursion, combined with 

 the mephitic air of stagnant, weedy waters, caused a 

 return of my companion's fever. 



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