In thé meanwhile the villagers were very merry, brewing
and drinking their pombé (beèr) by turns, one house
after the other providing the treat. On these occasions
the chief—who always drank freely, and more than any
other—heading the public gatherings of men and women,
saw the large earthen pots placed all in a row, and the
company taking long draughts from bowls made of plaited
straw, laughing as they drank, until, half-screwed, they
would begin bawling and shouting. To increase the merriment,
one or two jackanapes, with zebras’ manes tied
over their heads, would advance with long tubes like
monster bassoons, blowing with all their might, contorting
their faces and bodies, and going through the most
obscene and ridiculous motions to captivate their simple
admirers. This, however, was only the feast; the ball
then began, for the pots were no sooner emptied than five
drums at once, of different sizes and tones, suspended in a
line from a long horizontal bar, were beaten with fury, and
all the men, women, and children, singing and clapping
their hands in time, danced for hours together.
A report reached me, by some of Sirboko’s men, whom
he had sent to convey to us a small present of rice, that
an Arab, who was crossing Msalala to our northward, had
been treacherously robbed of all his arms and guns by a
small district chief, whose only excuse was that the Wan-
yamûézi had always traded very well by themselves until
the Arabs came into the country ; but now, as they were
robbed of their property, on account of the disturbances
caused by these Arabs, they intended for the future to take
all they could get, and challenged the Arabs to do the same.
My patience was beginning to suffer again, for I could
not help thinking that the chiefs of the place were preventing
their village men going with me in order that my
presence here might ward off the Watüta ; so I called
up the kirangozi, who had thirteen “Watoto,” as they
are called, or children of his own, wishing to go, and
asked him if he knew why no other men could be got.
As he could not tell me, saying some excused themselves
on the plea they were cutting their corn, and others that
they feared the Watuta, I resolved at once to move over
to Nunda; and if that place also failed to furnish men,
I would go on to Usui or Karagiie with what men I
had, and send back for the rest of my property; for
though I could not bear the idea of separating from
Grant, still the interests of old England were at stake,
and demanded it.
This resolve being strengthened by the kirangozi’s as-
iU i surance that the row in Msalala had shaken To Nttnda, 31«i. the few men who had half dreaded to go
with me, I marched over to Nunda, and put up with
Grant in Ukulima’s boma, when Grant informed me
Ukulima's Village.
that the chief had required four yards of cloth from him
for having walked round a dead lioness, as he had thus
destroyed a charm that protected his people against any
more of these; animals coming, although, fortunately, the
charm could be restored again by paying four yards of