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THE LAKE REGIONS OF CENTRAL AFRICA. 



caravan, and in the evening his carefully concealed 

 reasons leaked out — he wanted me to cure his son of 

 fever, and to " put the colophon" upon a neighbouring 

 hostile chief. At 8 p.m., I was aroused by my gun- 

 carrier, Mabruki, who handed to me my Ferrara, and 

 by the Baloch Riza, who reported that the palisade 

 was surrounded by a host of raging blacks. I went 

 out into the village, where the guard was running about 

 in a state of excitement which robbed them of their 

 wits, and I saw a long dark line of men sitting silently 

 and peaceably, though armed for fight, outside the 

 strong stockade. Having caused our cloth to be safely 

 housed, and given orders to be awakened if work began, 

 I returned to the hut, determined to take leave of Sultan 

 Maura and his quarrels on the next day. 



The porters were all gorged with beef, and three 

 were " stale- drunk" with the consequences of pombe ; 

 yet so anxious were they rendered by the gathering 

 clouds, and the spitting showers to reach their homes 

 before the setting in of the " sowing rains," that my task 

 was now rather to restrain than to stimulate their ardour : 

 the moon was resplendent, and had I wished it, they 

 would have set out at midnight. On the 4th November 

 we passed through another jungle-patch, to a village in 

 the fertile slopes of Ukona, where the Cannabis and the 

 Datura, with its large fetid flowers, disputed the ground 

 with brinjalls and castor-plants, holcus and panicum : 

 tobacco grew luxuriantly, and cotton-plots, carefully 

 hedged round against the cattle, afforded material for 

 the loom, which now appeared in every village. 



On the next day, we passed out of the fertile slopes 

 of Ukona, and traversed an open wavy country, 

 streaked with a thin forest of Mimosa, the Mtogwe or 

 wood-apple, and a large quadrangular cactus. Beyond 



