AN ANXIOUS PERIOD. 
201 
sage to the effect that they were about to arrive in 
Mosi, with the intention of burning, harrying, robbing, 
slaying everything in their way. Mandara therefore 
desired in such contingency the moral support of the 
white man’s friendship and co-operation. All the 
soldiers w r ere naturally withdrawn from the blockade 
of my settlement, I was once more at liberty to go 
forth and botanize, and no restrictions were placed in 
the way of my purchasing food. However, I was too 
angry with Mandara for what he had made me suffer 
to respond very cordially to his advances. I refused 
to co-operate in the defence of Mosi, and said I would 
keep all my powder and ammunition for the safe¬ 
guarding of my own settlement. Of course the Wa- 
kiboso stopped short at the frontier on this occasion. 
I premised they would from the fact that they had 
sent to say they were coming. But, nevertheless, they 
had evidently inflicted a severe blow on Mandara’s 
strength, and one which for a long time kept him 
quiet. Gradually my relations with him began to im¬ 
prove. His people were so decidedly my friends, that 
he was forced, despotic monarch though he was, to come 
over to their opinion. They declared my coming had 
brought wealth to them all. I bought all their pro¬ 
ducts and paid for them honestly. No man could ever 
accuse me of an unjust or unfriendly act. When they 
were sick, they came for medicine, and were never 
denied. 3 In short Mandara was compelled by popular 
opinion to own he had treated me badly, and as a sign 
3 A curious incident in my quarrel with Mandara was, that even 
when our relations were at the worst, he would calmly send to me for 
medicine for himself, his wives, and children. One of his Swahilis 
cautioned him that perhaps I might take advantage of this to poison 
him, hut Mandara said quietly, “ A black man might do so, hut a 
white man never would.” 
