to my home.” * What provision do you want ? ” I said,
Five cows and five goats, as we shan’t be long in Uganda;
and it is not the custom of our country, when we go visiting,
to carry anything away with us. The king then
said, “Well, I wish to give you much, but you won’t have
i t ; ” when Budja spoke out, saying, “ Bana does not know
the country he has to travel through; there is nothing
hut jungle and famine on the way, and he must have
cows; ” on which the king ordered us sixty cows, fourteen
goats, ten loads of butter, a load of coffee and tobacco,
one hundred sheets of mbugu, as clothes for my men,
at a suggestion of Bombay’s, as all my cloth had been
expended even before I left Karagud.
This magnificent order created a pause, which K’yengo
took advantage of by producing a little bundle of peculiarly
shaped sticks and a lump of earth—all of which
have their own particular magical powers, as K’yengo
described to the king’s satisfaction. After this, Viarungi
pleaded the cause of my mutinous followers, till I shook
my finger angrily at him before the king, rebuked him for
intermeddling in other people’s affairs, and told my own
story, which gained the sympathy of the king, and induced
him to say, (i Supposing they desert Bana, what
road do they expect to get ? ” Mafila was now appointed
to go with Rozaro to Karagiid for the powder and other
things promised yesterday, whilst Viarungi and all his
party, though exceedingly anxious to get away, had orders
to remain here prisoners as a surety for the things arriving.
Further, Kaddii and two other Wakungu received
orders to go to Usui with two tusks of ivory to purchase
gunpowder, caps, and flints, failing which they would
proceed to Unyanyembe, and even to Zanzibar, for the
king must not be disappointed, and failure would cost
them their lives.
Not another word was said, and away the two parties
went, with no more arrangement than a set of geese—
Maüla without a letter, and Kaddii without any provision
for the way, as if all the world belonged to Mtésa, and he
could help himself from any man’s garden that he liked,
no matter where he was. In the evening my men made
a humble petition for their discharge, even if I did not
pay them, producing a hundred reasons for wishing to
' leave me, but none which would stand a moment’s argument
: the fact was, they were afraid of the road to Un-
yoro, thinking I had not sufficient ammunition.
6 th.—I visited the king, and asked leave for boats to go
at once; but the fleet admiral put a veto on this by making
out that dangerous shallows exist between the Murchison
Creek and the Kira district station, so that the boats of
one place never visit the other; and further, if we went
to Kira, we should find impracticable cataracts to the
Urondogani boat-station; our better plan would therefore
be, to deposit our property at the Urondogani station, and
walk by land up the river, if a sight of the falls at the
mouth of the lake was of such material consequence to us.
Of course this man carried everything his own way, for
there was nobody able to contradict him, and we could
not afford time to visit Usoga first, lest by the delay we
might lose an opportunity of communicating with Pethe-
rick. Grant now took a portrait of Mtésa by royal permission,
the king sitting as quietly as his impatient nature
would permit. Then at home the Wanyamüózi porters
received their tusks of ivory, weighing from 16 to 50 lb.
each, and took a note besides on Rümanika each for
twenty fundo of beads, barring one Bogüó man, who,
having lent a cloth to the expedition some months previously,
thought it would not be paid him, and therefore
seized a sword as security; the consequence was, his tusk
was seized until the sword was returned, and he was dismissed
minus his beads, for having so misconducted
himself. The impudent fellow then said, “ It will be well
2 F