328 
ELEPHANT-HUNTING IN EAST AFRICA 
CHAP. 
his warriors that their day had arrived to do or to die, Labugo, 
spear and shield in hand, led the charge upon the confident 
foe with such effect that the assailants were put to flight with 
great slaughter. This account raised Labugo very much in 
my estimation, proving him to be as different in character as 
he was in appearance from the orthodox type of obese, self- 
indulgent African monarch, cruel and cowardly ; and though 
he resembled others in his rapacity for presents, by which he 
worried me a good deal, I could not but feel a respect for this 
tall, active, and redoubtable savage. 
Hamisi also introduced to me an affable old man whom 
he called his father, with whom I had an interesting chat 
through his adopted son’s interpretation. I found out from 
him that these people know little or nothing of the country 
beyond their own immediate neighbourhood. The petty 
detached tribes with which it is so curiously peopled are 
mostly at enmity, and always distrustful of each other, so that 
there is little communication except within the narrowest 
limits. He told me that they believed that there was a tribe 
of cannibals living to the northward, but the only evidence 
they had was the testimony of a woman who had run away 
from there and found her way to Kere, where she had since 
made her home. She described how they bound their victims, 
he explained, while he demonstrated- the method for my 
edification by drawing up his legs as he sat on the ground, 
his knees against his chin and his calves touching his thighs, 
at the same time clasping his arms round his doubled-up legs. 
In this position they were put alive into huge pots, water 
poured in, and fires lighted under them. I told him I thought 
the tale was probably invented by the woman out of spite 
against the people she had escaped from ; but he evidently 
believed it. He also gave me an account of a great flood 
which had occurred on the river, when the water reached 
nearly to their kraal, which is on pretty high ground, bringing 
down huts, cattle, and human bodies. 
