beyond description ; and their abhorrence of anything
like order increases their natural dislike to Europeans.
I have not one man even approaching to a servant;
the animals are neglected, therefore they die. And
were I to die they would rejoice, as they would immediately
join Koorshid’s people in cattle stealing and
slave hunting ;—charming followers in the time of
danger! Such men destroy all pleasure, and render
exploration a mere toil. No one can imagine the hardships
and annoyances to which we are subject, with the
additional disgust of being somewhat dependent upon
the traders’ band of robbers. For this miserable situation
my vakeel is entirely responsible : had my original
escort been faithful, I should have been entirely independent,
and could with my transport animals have
penetrated far south before the commencement of the
rainy season. Altogether I am thoroughly sick of
this expedition, but I shall plod onwards with dogged
obstinacy ; God only knows the end. I shall be grate*-
fid should the day ever arrive once more to see Old
England.”
Both my wife and I were excessively ill with bilious
fever, and neither could assist the other. The old
chief, Katchiba, hearing that we were dying, came to
charm us with some magic spell. He found us
lying helpless, and he immediately procured a small
branch of a tree, and filling his mouth with water, he
squirted it over the leaves and about the floor of the
h u t; he then waved the branch around my wife’s head,
also around mine, and completed the ceremony by
sticking it in the thatch above the doorway; he told
us we should now get better, and perfectly satisfied, he
took his leave. The hut was swarming with rats and
white ants, the former racing over our bodies during
the night, and burrowing through the floor, filling our
only room with mounds like mole-hills. As fast as we
stopped the holes, others were made with determined
perseverance. Having a supply of arsenic, I gave
them an entertainment, the effect being disagreeable to
all parties, as the rats died in their holes, and created
a horrible effluvium, while fresh hosts took the plaee of
the departed. Now and then a snake would be seen
gliding within the thatch, having taken shelter from
the pouring rain.
The smallpox was raging throughout the country,
and the natives were dying like flies in winter. The
country was extremely unhealthy, owing to the constant
rain and the rank herbage, which prevented a
free circulation of air, and from the extreme damp
induced fevers. The temperature was 65 Fahi. at night,
and 72° during the day; dense clouds obscured the
sun for many days, and the air was reeking with