Suwarora Had Ordered His Subjects To Run Up A Line
Of Bomas To Protect His Frontier, And Had Proclaimed His
Intention To Kill Every Coast-Man Who Dared Attempt To Enter
Usui.
My heart was ready to sink as I turned into bed, and I was
driven to think of abandoning everybody who was not strong enough
to go on with me carrying a load.
3d to 13th. - Baraka, hearing I had arrived, then came back to me,
and confirmed Musa's words. The Arabs, too, came flocking in to
beg, nay implore, me to help them out of their difficulties. Many
of them were absolutely ruined, they said; others had their
houses full of stores unemployed. At Ugogo those who wished to
join them were unable to do so, for their porters, what few were
left, were all dying of starvation; and at that moment Manua Sera
was hovering about, shooting, both night and day, all the poor
villagers in the district, or driving them away. Would to God,
they said, I would mediate for them with Manua Sera - they were
sure I would be successful - and then they would give me as many
armed men as I liked. Their folly in all their actions, I said,
proved to me that anything I might attempt to do would be futile,
for their alliance with the Watuta, when they were not prepared
to act, at once damned them in my eyes as fools. This they in
their terror acknowledged, but said it was not past remedy, if I
would join them, to counteract what had been done in that matter.
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