at it as a dog pulls at a quarter of horse, roused rue
with loud impatient “ Whu-hu” and “ Hi, hi’s,” until
at last, out of patience, I sent my boots whirling at
his head. This cleared the room, hut only for a moment
: the boisterous, impudent crowd, true to savage
nature, enjoying the annoyance they had occasioned,
returned exultingly, with shouts and grins, in double
numbers.
The Beluches then interfered, and, in their zeal to
keep order, irritated some drunkards, who at once became
pugnacious. On seeing the excited state of these
drunkards, bawling and stepping about in long, sudden,
and rapid strides, with brandished spears and
agitated bows, endeavouring to exasperate the rest of
the mob against us, I rose, and going out before them,
said that I came forth for their satisfaction, and that
they might now stand and gaze as long as they liked;
but I hoped, as soon as their legs and arms were tired,
that they would depart .in peace. The words acted
with magical effect upon them; they urgently requested
me to retire again, but finding that I did not, they took
themselves homewards. The sultan arrived late in the
evening, he said from a long distance, on purpose to
see me, and was very importunate in his desire for my
halting a day. As I had paid all the other sultans the
compliment of a visit, he should consider it a slight if
I did not stay a little while with him. On the occasion
of my passing northwards he had been absent,
and could not entertain m e ; so I must now accept a
bullock, which he would send for on the morrow. A
long debate ensued, which ended by my giving him
one shukka merikani and one dhoti kiniki.
13 ¿A—Travelling through the Nindo Wilderness
to-day, the Beluches were very much excited at the
quantity of game they saw; but though they tried
their best, they did not succeed in killing any. Troops
of zebras, and giraffe, some varieties of antelopes roaming
about in large herds, a buffalo and one ostrich,
were the chief visible tenants of this wild. We saw
the fresh prints of a very large elephant; and I have
no doubt that by any sportsman, if he had but leisure
to learn their haunts and watering-places, a good
account might be made of them—but one and all are
wild in the extreme. Ostrich-feathers bedeck the
frizzly polls of many men and women, but no one has
ever heard of any having been killed or snared by
huntsmen. These ornaments, as well as the many
skulls and skins seen in every house, are said to be
found lying about in places where the animals have
died a natural death.
14 th.—We left, as we did yesterday, an hour before
dawn, and crossed the second broad wilderness to Ka-
hama. At 9 a .m . I called the usual halt to eat my
rural breakfast of cold fowl, sour curd, cakes, and eggs,
in a village on the south border of the desert. As the
houses .were devoid of all household commodities, I
asked the people stopping there to tend the fields to
explain the reason, and learnt that their fear of the
plundering Wamanda was such that they only came
there during the day to look after their crops, and at