He Was Very Civil To Me, And Offered To Sell Me A Most Charming
Young Woman, Quite The Belle Of
The country; but as he could not
bring me to terms, he looked over my picture-books with the
greatest
Delight, and afterwards went into a discourse on
geography with considerable perspicacity; seeming fully to
comprehend that if I got down the Nile it would afterwards result
in making the shores of the N'yanza like that of the coast at
Zanzibar, where the products of his country could be exchanged,
without much difficulty, for cloths, beads, and brass wire. I
gave him a present; then a letter was brought to me from Sheikh
Said, announcing Musa's death, and the fact that Manua Sera was
still holding out at Kigue; in answer to which I desired the
sheikh to send me as many of Musa's slaves as would take service
with me, for they ought now, by the laws of the Koran, to be all
free.
On packing up to leave Ghiya's, all the men of the village shut
the bars of the entrance, wishing to extract some cloths from me,
as I had not given enough, they said, to their chief. They soon,
however, saw that we, being inside their own fort, had the best
of it, and they gave way. We then pushed on to Ungurue's,
another chief of the same district. Here the men and women of
the place came crowding to see me, the fair sex all playfully
offering themselves for wives, and wishing to know which I
admired most. They were so importunate, after a time, that I was
not sorry to hear an attack was made on their cattle because a
man of the village would not pay his dowry-money to his father-
in-law, and this set everybody flying out to the scene of action.
After this, as Bombay brought up the last of my skulking men, I
bade him good-bye again, and made an afternoon-march on to
Takina, in the district of Msalala, which we no sooner approached
than all the inhabitants turned out and fired their arrows at us.
They did no harm, however, excepting to create a slight alarm,
which some neighbouring villagers took advantage of to run of
with two of my cows. To be returned to them, but called in vain,
as the scoundrels said, "Findings are keepings, by the laws of
our country; and as we found your cows, so we will keep them."
For my part I was glad they were gone, as the Wanguana never yet
kept anything I put under their charge; so, instead of allowing
them to make a fuss the next morning, I marched straight on for
M'ynoga's, the chief of the district, who was famed for his
infamy and great extortions, having pushed his exactions so far
as to close the road.
On nearing his palace, we heard war-drums beat in every
surrounding village, and the kirangozi would go no farther until
permission was obtained from M'yonga.
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