Bui Then,
Quaking With Fright At My Obstinacy, Said, "You Must - Indeed You
Must - Give In And Do With These
Savage chiefs as the Arabs when
they travel, for I will not be a party to riding rough-shod over
Them." Still I stuck out, and the grey-beards departed to tell
their chief of it. Next morning he sent them back to say he
would not be cheated out of his rights as the chief of the
district. Still I would not give in, and the whole day kept
"jawing" without effect, for I could get no man to go with me
until the chief gave his sanction. I then tried to send Bombay
off with Bui, Nasib, and their guide, by night; but though Bombay
was willing, the other two hung back on the old plea. In this
state of perplexity, Bui begged I would allow him to go over to
Lumeresi and see what he could do with a present. Bui really now
was my only stand-by, so I sent him off, and next had the
mortification to find that he had been humbugged by honeyed
words, as Baraka had been with Makaka, into believing that
Lumeresi was a good man, who really had no other desire at heart
than the love of seeing me. His boma, he said, did not lie much
out of my line, and he did not wish a stitch of my cloth. So far
from detaining me, he would give me as many men as I wanted; and,
as an earnest of his good intentions, he sent his copper hatchet,
the badge of office as chief of the district, as a guarantee for
me.
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