This Speech Was Hardly Pronounced When Kajunju, A Fine Athletic
Man, Dropped Suddenly In, Nodded A Friendly Recognition To Budja,
And wished to know what the Waganda meant by taking us back, for
the king had heard of their intention
Last night; and when told
by Budja his story, and by Kidgwiga mine, he vanished like a
shadow. Budja, now turning to me, said, "If you won't go back, I
shall; for the orders of Mtesa must always be obeyed, else lives
will be lost; and I shall tell him that you, since leaving his
country, and getting your road, have quite forgotten him." "If
you give such a message as that," I said, "you will tell a
falsehood. Mtesa has no right to order me out of another man's
house, to be an enemy with one whose friendship I desire. I am
not only in honour bound to speak with Kamrasi, but I am also
bound to carry out the orders of my country just as much as you
are yours; moreover, I have invited Petherick to come to
Kamrasi's by a letter from Karague, and it would be ill-becoming
in me to desert him in the hands of an enemy, as he would then
certainly find Kamrasi to be if I went back now." Budja then
tried the coaxing dodge, saying, "There is much reason in your
words, but I am sorry you do not listen to the king, for he loves
you as a brother. Did you not go about like two brothers -
walking, talking, shooting, and even eating together? It was the
remark of all the Waganda, and the king will be so vexed when he
finds you have thrown him over. I did not tell you before, but
the king says, 'How can I answer Rumanika if Kamrasi injures
Bana? Had I known Kamrasi was such a savage, I would not have let
Bana go there; and I should now have sent a forge to take him
away, only that some accident might arise from it by Kamrasi's
taking fright; the road even to Gani shall be got by force if
necessary.'" Then, finding me still persistent, Budja turned
again and threatened us with the king's power, saying, "If you
choose to disobey, we will see whether you ever get the road to
Gani or not; for Kamrasi is at war on all sides with his
brothers, and Mtesa will ally himself with them at any moment
that he wishes, and where will you be then?"
Saying this, Budja walked off, muttering that our being here
would much embarrass Mtesa's actions; whilst my Wanguana, who had
been attentively listening, like timid hares, made up their minds
to leave me, and tried, through Bombay, to obtain a final
interview with me, saying they knew Mtesa's power, and
disobedience to him would only end in taking away all chance of
escape. In reply, I said I would not listen to them, as I had
seen enough of them to know it was no use speaking to a pack of
unreasonable cowards, having tried it so often before; but I sent
a message requesting them, if they did desert me at last, to
leave my guns; and, further, added an intimation that, as soon as
they reached the coast, they would be put into prison for three
years. The scoundrels insolently said "tuende setu" (let's be
off), rushed to the Waganda drums, and beat the march.
1st. - Early in the morning, as Budja drummed the home march, I
called him up, gave him a glass rain-gauge as a letter for Mtesa,
and instructed him to say I would send a man to Mtesa as soon as
I had seen Kamrasi about opening the road; that I trusted he
would take all the guns from the deserters and keep them for me,
but the men themselves I wished transported to an island on the
N'yanza, for I could never allow such scoundrels again to enter
my camp. It was the effect of desertions like these that
prevented any white men visiting these countries. This said, the
Waganda all left us, taking with them twenty-eight Wanguana,
armed with twenty-two carbines. Amongst them was the wretched
governess, Manamaka, who had always thought me a wonderful
magician, because I possessed, in her belief, an extraordinary
power in inclining all the black kings' hearts to me, and induced
them to give the roads no one before of my colour had ever
attempted to use.
With a following reduced to twenty men, armed with fourteen
carbines, I now wished to start for Kamrasi's, but had not even
sufficient force to lift the loads. A little while elapsed, and
a party of fifty Wanyoro rushed wildly into camp, with their
spears uplifted, and looked for the Waganda, but found them gone.
The athletic Kajunju, it transpired, had returned to Kamrasi's,
told him our story, and received orders to snatch us away from
the Waganda by force, for the great Mkamma, or king, was most
anxious to see his white visitors; such men had never entered
Unyoro before, and neither his father nor his father's fathers
had ever been treated with such a visitation; therefore he had
sent on these fifty men to fall by surprise on the Waganda, and
secure us. But again, in a little while, about 10 a.m., Kajunju,
in the same wild manner, at the head of 150 warriors, with the
soldier's badge - a piece of mbugu or plantain-leaf tied round
their heads, and a leather sheath on their spear-heads, tufted
with cow's-tail - rushed in exultingly, having found, to their
delight, that there was no one left to fight with, and that they
had gained an easy victory. They were certainly a wild set of
ragamuffins - as different as possible from the smart, well-
dressed, quick-of-speech Waganda as could be, and anything but
prepossessing to our eyes. However, they had done their work,
and I offered them a cow, wishing to have it shot before them;
but the chief men, probably wishing the whole animal to
themselves, took it alive, saying the men were all the king's
servants, and therefore could not touch a morsel.
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