384 Wanderings in Eastern Africa. 
the Mzungu's mtume (white man's prophet). My mis- 
sionaiy character had evidently been discussed, and 
I was now to be made the butt of these two men. 
Muinyi Mbuana, somewhat confused at the question, 
yet irreverently and mockingly replied, Isn't it 
Kiritosi } " (Christ.) Here I interposed with some 
feeling, begging them to speak of such matters more 
-seriously. Both, I think, felt rebuked ; and Mandara 
proposed his next question to his friend, asking him 
who was the prophet of the Wasuahili. As Mbuana 
would not mention Muhammad's name, the mange 
did it for him ; but," he continued, neither is our 
prophet ; we have our own ideas of these things.'' 
Then, calling for more toddy and drinking hard, 
he relapsed into a dismal silence. He reminded me 
of Polyphemus in the cave when visited by Ulysses 
and party. His silence was only as the dead calm 
which often prevails before the bursting of the 
terrific cyclone. The fumes of the pombe were 
getting into his head ; his brain was whirling ; his 
countenance grew dark with frenzy ; from his one 
eye shot fierce gleams ; his whole frame became 
agitated ; and then suddenly starting to his feet he . 
seized a club, whirled it furiously over his head, 
and howled out, at the top of his voice, some snatches 
of a native war-song. He looked like a demoniac 
possessed by a legion of evil spirits. Sitting on the 
ground, as I did, at his feet, I felt anything but 
comfortable ; for in such a state of extreme excite- 
ment he knew not what he was doing, and might 
have smashed my skull ; a performance over which I 
knew he would have felt no more compunction than he 
would do over the cracking of a cocoa-nut ! Though 
