One Uganda officer and one
Kidi guide were sent to my hut by the king, as agreed upon
yesterday,
When I detached Mabruki and Bilal from my men, gave
them letters and maps addressed to Petherick; and giving the
officers a load of Mtende to pay their hotel bills on the way, I
gave them, at the same time, strict orders to keep by the Nile;
then, having dismissed them, I called on the king to make
arrangements for Grant, and to complain that my residence in
Uganda was anything but cheerful, as my hut was a mile from the
palace, in an unhealthy place, where he kept his Arab visitors.
It did not become my dignity to live in houses appropriated to
persons in the rank of servants, which I considered the ivory
merchants to be; and as I had come only to see him and the high
officers of Uganda, not seeking for ivory or slaves, I begged he
would change my place of residence to the west end, when I also
trusted his officers would not be ashamed to visit me, as
appeared to be the case at present. Silence being the provoking
resort of the king, when he did not know exactly what to say, he
made no answer to my appeal, but instead, he began a discourse on
geography, and then desired me to call upon his mother,
N'yamasore, at her palace Masorisori, vulgarly called Soli Soli,
for she also required medicine; and, moreover, I was cautioned
that for the future the Uganda court etiquette required I should
attend on the king two days in succession, and every third day on
his mother the queen-dowager, as such were their respective
rights.
Till now, owing to the strict laws of the country, I had not been
able to call upon anybody but the king himself. I had not been
able to send presents or bribes to any one, nor had any one,
except the cockaded pages, by the king's order, visited me;
neither was anybody permitted to sell me provisions, so that my
men had to feed themselves by taking anything they chose from
certain gardens pointed out by the king's officers, or by seizing
pombe or plantains which they might find Waganda carrying towards
the palace. This non-interventive order was part of the royal
policy, in order that the king might have the full fleecing of
his visitors.
To call upon the queen-mother respectfully, as it was the opening
visit, I too, besides the medicine-chest, a present of eight
brass and copper wire, thirty blue-egg beads, one bundle of
diminutive beads, and sixteen cubits of chintz, a small guard,
and my throne of royal grass. The palace to be visited lay half
a mile beyond the king's, but the highroad to it was forbidden
me, as it is considered uncourteous to pass the king's gate
without going in. So after winding through back-gardens, the
slums of Bandowaroga, I struck upon the highroad close to her
majesty's, where everything looked like the royal palace on a
miniature scale.
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