THE GRAPHIC 
June 20, 1885 
636 
of the various slave caravans. These unscrupulous men, 
who would gladly see my throat cut and my goods distri¬ 
buted among themselves, are far more dangerous enemies than 
Mandara at his worst, for that savage has just a vestige of 
humanity and bonhomie mixed with his untutored rapacity, 
and, moreover, cannot rid himself of a lurking fear lest the 
English Consul’s arm may be long enough and strong enough 
to strike from the coast to Kilima-njaro and avenge my 
death, a possibility which the less ignorant Wa-Swahili laugh 
to scorn. So, perhaps, as Mandara sits in the morning hic¬ 
cupping over his potations of banana beer, and begins to 
grumble in his cups about “his” white-man’s close-fistedness, 
the wily councillors gradually work him up from a state of 
ill-humour into a blind fury. They remind him how the 
“Baroni” (Baron von der Pecken) was mulcted by Man- 
dara’s mother of sainted memory, when he ventured to visit 
Moshi ; of how Mandara himself had taken from the “padre” 
New his gold watch, his silver instrument of unknown use 
(aneroid), and many other things; how, too, Thornon 
but a year ago had been forced to give up 
all the guns and clothes that Mandara had 
demanded; and yet in all these cases the 
English Consul had made no remonstrance, 
nay, rather, had he not sent gifts of powder 
and lead and cloth to Mandara, and letters 
expressing friendship? And who was this 
other white man, to oppose Mandara’s wishes 
and refuse his demands ? Thomson had a hun¬ 
dred men and more with him ; yet he preferred 
to give rather than to fight. What, therefore, 
should this other white man do, who had but 
ten soldiers? Let Mandara send, therefore, to 
this stranger in the land, and say, ‘ Give me 
this, and this, and this, and I will let you stay 
here in peace; but if you answer proudly, 
and refuse me, I will send many soldiers, 
who shall kill you and all your men, burn 
your houses, uproot your gardens, and the 
place shall know you no more. And if the 
Baloza (Consul) sends to inquire after you, 
I will say you are gone into the land of the 
Masai, and perchance they have killed you 
there. ’ ” 
This message is no sooner concocted than 
Mandara is impatient to send it red-hot and see 
the result. Accordingly, about noon, a naked 
gentleman, with a broad-bladed shining spear 
and a monkey-skin head-dress, struts into our 
settlement with an easy nonchalance of manner 
which makes an evident impression on the Zanzi¬ 
baris, for they do not attempt to oppose his 
passage into my private compound, but allow 
him to enter unchallenged, plant his spear 
into the ground with an emphasis that makes 
it quiver, and stand at ease in a conqueror’s 
pose. 
Perhaps my temper has been already ruffled 
that morning. We may have lost our favourite 
milch goat or fattest sheep in the night, 
carried off by hyaenas; or I may have 
suddenly learned that the natives ■ refuse to 
sell milk, fowls, or other provisions, in obe¬ 
dience to secret orders from their chief. Or, 
for misfortunes never come singly, my ser¬ 
vant may have fallen sick, or my cook 
have cut off his finger chopping wood. So 
when I look up from my work, perhaps 
skinning birds that lend themselves badly 
to my taxidermist skill, and see the 
swarthy figure planted in front of my house, I wrathfully 
cry out to my attendants, “What does this man want 
here, and why do you let him in without telling me ? ” 
Abdallah comes forward, and mildly questions the Chaga 
warrior as to his purpose. “ Words from Mandara,” he laconi¬ 
cally replies, and then, the interpreter being summoned, 
proceeds to detail the ultimatum of the Chief—so many 
guns, barrels of powder, bags of shot, tables, chairs, cups and 
saucers, knives, forks, and spoons to be handed over at once, 
together with the greater part of my trade goods, or —and then 
follow Mandara’s terrible threats of slaughter and rapine. The 
purport of this speech I somewhat understand from the occasional 
words and phrases of Ki-Chaga that are familiar to me, and any 
doubt as to the import of the threats which close the message is set 
aside by the man’s expressive gesture. When he comes to talk of 
killing he draws the edge of his dexter finger across his throat, 
severing in fancy his jugular vein. At the close of his speech the 
Swahili interpreter repeats all that has been said, striving to 
exaggerate as much as possible the gruesome nature of the threats, 
and the advisability of conceding everything asked for. But I have 
long since made up my mind. To yield to the “ Sultan’s ” demands 
would entail the loss of all means of defence, of livelihood, 
and would be the ruin of the expedition. Even if I succeeded 
in reaching the coast, it would mean that I had failed in my 
attempt, and all this would be far worse than the risk of assassi¬ 
nation at Mandara’s hands, for I knew his moods varied with 
his potations. So affecting a calm manner which I do not feel 
I refuse Mandara’s demands in toto. (“ Hatta sindano”) “Not 
even a needle,” I add, taking one from my coat lappet and 
showing it. This reply having been explained to the envoy he 
withdraws stolidly to repeat it to his master, and I am left 
alone with my men to discuss the further proceedings to be 
taken. Of course only the leading men of the caravan are 
consulted ; the rank and file are supposed to be left in ignor¬ 
ance of our danger lest panic should seize them. They know 
well enough, however, having questioned the Chaga soldier, 
and now sit in a melancholy group discussing the probability 
of having their throats cut, and rueing openly the day that 
their ill fortune brought them to such a country. How¬ 
ever, I have finished my confabulations, and now order the 
men to go about their work as if nothing had happened, or 
was going to happen. One man is told to go and get firewood. 
KILIMA-NJARO SEEN FROM ABOVE MOSHI (“ PALMS AND SNOW”) 
He takes an axe, and reluctantly leaves the timorous group of 
gossipers, but behold! he has scarcely got a hundred yards 
from the cleared ground of the settlement, when we see him 
turning about and hastily retracing his steps, while from the 
brushwood and fern rise the glinting spears and white head¬ 
dresses of Mandara’s soldiers. It is then, on going to investi¬ 
gate, that I find we are regularly invested by an irregular 
ring of armed warriors, who are squatted in the grass and 
fern, without however any attempt at concealment. They have 
formed a cordon which they intimate must not be broken until 
the demands of the “Mange” (as they call their chief) are 
satisfied. Though firm in their language they are not uncivil, 
and are evidently only performing their duty. They are even 
respectful to me personally, evidently assuming that a quarrel 
between the white man and their chief is not their affair. We 
learn from them that Mandara means to try and starve us 
into submission, that he intends to place these soldiers here 
to cut us off from all further food supplies. I laugh at 
this. “What,” I ask, “does Mandara know I hai.. eighty 
fowls, a cow, a calf, four goats, and two sheep, beside a store¬ 
house crammed with grain and a garden full of vegetables ? 
Say, how long can we not live on those supplies, and does 
your chief intend to keep you here for months?” They only 
shrug their shoulders indifferently. “ Theirs not to reason 
why, theirs but to do or die.” One man, however, suggests 
that perhaps if my water supply were cut off at the river head I 
might not feel so comfortable. I then ask what the other Chaga 
people would say, whom my little canal also supplies with water ? 
Meanwhile my message, with its decided refusal, has reached 
Mandara, and we can from our height conjecture somewhat the 
effect produced. How anxiously our gaze wanders over the inter¬ 
vening valley, and rests on the little cluster of yellow beehive huts 
which masks Mandara’s capital ! We have seen the messenger 
enter the town, and after more than a quarter of an hour’s interval 
he emerges alone, and once more takes the winding hill-path to our 
settlement. I am affecting to continue my work in my hut, for it 
would not do to let either my own men or the natives perceive that 
I am 'alarmed at the critical state of affairs, but as I stoop 
over my bird-skins again I hear the clang of a spear-shaft 
striking the hard ground, and again Mandara’s emissary stands 
before me. 
“ The Mange wants to see two of your men,” he says. 
“ I will go myself,” I reply, getting my hat 
and stick. 
I “No,” answers the envoy, “Mandara does 
not want to see the white man. His heart 
is bitter. Send two of your servants.” 
After considerable parleying, for my men 
naturally feel that it is like entering the lion’s 
den, Abdallah and another Zanzibari volunteer 
to go on this dangerous errand. Accordingly 
they set out, secretly armed with revolvers, 
and accompany the soldier to Mandara’s town. 
Eollowing their progress with my opera-glass 
I see them enter the native compound, and 
then ensues an anxious wait before they re-issue 
and make their way alone back to Kitimbiriu. 
When they enter the settlement I see bad news 
painted on their lineaments, so I hurry them 
into my house before they can communicate it 
to my quaking men. When they are seated in 
the doorway of my dwelling, their dark bodies 
like silhouettes against the flaming evening sky, 
they unfold their ominous tale. 
When they had reached Mandara’s place, it 
seems, they found him seated among his coun¬ 
cillors and captains in a quivering rage. His 
one eye gleamed with anger, and his whole 
frame trembled with convulsive wrath. Speak¬ 
ing slowly and distinctly, evidently trying to 
keep control over himself, he told them that 
there was but one ruler in the country, and 
that one he. It sufficed for him to send an 
order to the white man and it must be instantly 
obeyed, or the throat of every man in the 
settlement should be cut. “What,” he ex¬ 
claimed, “ do I care for his Consul or his 
Queeny? Have I not a thousand soldiers? 
Go and tell him 1 ” The men crept away from 
the precincts of the irate monarch thoroughly 
cowed, but they were not gone far before he 
sent to recall them. On again entering his 
presence, Mandara assailed them with impre¬ 
cations and horrible threats, and dismissed 
them a second time, summoned them back 
again, hurled at them hoarsely more vitupe¬ 
ration, and finally bade them hurry to my 
presence and inform me what they had 
heard. 
This they are in no way loth to do, fear¬ 
ing, indeed, for their lives in this assemblage 
of warriors armed to the teeth, whom a word 
from their chief would precipitate on any victim of his wrath. I 
suspect, even when I hear their terrified account, that this scene 
was a good bit of clever acting on Mandara’s part, meant to 
have its due effect on me by the panic it should produce among 
my men. 
At any rate, as we sit in the gloom of the early night still 
discussing our situation, my dinner untouched on the table, and, to 
judge from the gleam of their watch fires in the bush, the soldiers 
of Mandara still encircling us, the prospect seems a sufficiently 
sombre one. Nor does the night bring a temporary truce to my 
anxieties. I find it difficult to compose myself to sleep, for my 
brain is continually forming projects for escaping secretly from 
Mandaia’s country, and yet carrying away somehow my fifty-eight 
loads of goods; a well-nigh impossible feat to accomplish with ten 
men. Every sudden noise from the bush, the anxious whispers 
from my w'atching men, the distant blowing of a horn, or firing of 
a gun makes me start from bed wideawake and dreading a midnight 
attack from the savages. And when towards dawn I find a short 
forgetfulness in fitful dozing, it is but to awake on a morrow of 
similar anxiety, nor do the days of happiness and peace return till 
Mandara’s hostility and avarice have been dissipated by patient 
resistance on my part and a fickle temperament on his. 
II. II. Johnston 
