mad with delight. Wishing to have a talk with him
about Petherick and Grant, I at once started off the
Wakungti to thank him for the present, and to beg pardon
for my apparent rudeness of yesterday, at the same time
requesting I might have an early interview with his
majesty, as I had. much of importance to communicate;
but the solemn court formalities which these African kings
affect as much as Oriental emperors, precluded my message
from reaching the king. I heard, however, that he had
spent the day receiving Suwarora’s hongo of wire, and
that the officer who brought them was made to sit in an
empty court, whilst the king sat behind a screen, never
deigning to show his majestic person. I was told, too,
that he opened conversation by demanding to know how
it happened that Suwarora became possessed of the wires,
for they were made by the white men to be given to
himself, and Stiwarora must therefore have robbed me of
them; and it was by such practices he, Mtesa, never could
see any visitors. The officer’s reply was, Siiwarora would
not show the white men any respect, because they were
wizards who did not sleep in houses at night, but flew up
to the tops of hills, and practised sorcery of every abominable
kind. The king to this retorted, in a truly African
fashion, “ That’s a lie ; I can see no harm in this white
man; and if he had been a bad man, Rumanika would
not have sent him on to me.” At night, when in bed, the
king sent his pages to say, if I desired his friendship I
would lend him one musket to make up six with what I
had given him, for he intended visiting his relations the
following morning. I sent three, feeling that nothing
would be lost by being “ open-handed.”
22d.—To-day the king went the round of his relations,
showing the beautiful things given him by the white
man—a clear proof that he was much favoured by the
“ spirits,” for neither his father nor any of his forefathers
had been so recognised and distinguished by any “ sign”
as a rightful inheritor to the Uganda throne: an anti-
Christian interpretation of omens, as rife in these dark
regions now as it was in the time of King Nebuchadnezzar.
At midnight the three muskets were returned,
and I was so pleased with the young king’s promptitude
and honesty, I begged he would accept them.
23d—At noon Mtesa sent his pages to invite me to
his palace. I went, with, my guard of honour and my
stool, but found I had to sit waiting in an ante-hut three
hours with his commander-in-chief and other high officers
before he was ready to see me. During this time Wasoga
minstrels, playing on tambira, and accompanied, by boys
playing on a harmonicon, kept us amused; and a small
page, with a large bundle of grass, came to me and said,
“ The king hopes you won’t be offended if required to sit
on it before him; for no person in Uganda, however high
in office, is ever allowed to sit upon anything raised above
the ground, nor can anybody but himself sit upon such
grass as this; it is all' that his throne is made of. The
first day he only allQwed you to sit on your stool to
appease your wrath.”
On consenting to do in “ Rome as the Romans do,”
when my position was so handsomely acknowledged, I
was called in, and found the court sitting much as it
was on the first day’s interview, only that the number of
squatting Wakungti was much diminished; and the king,
instead of wearing his ten brass and copper rings, had my
gold one on his third finger. This day, however, was
cut out for business, as, in addition to the assemblage
of officers, there were women, cows, goats, fowls, confiscations,
baskets of fish, baskets of small antelopes, porcupines,
and curious rats caught by his gamekeepers,
bundles of mbiigti, &c. &c.', made by his linen-drapers,
coloured earths and sticks by his magician, all ready for
presentation; but, as rain fell, the court broke up, and
I had nothing for it but to walk about under my um