“ T ake everybody, do anything you like; I
will give yo u Sekebobo and all his men.”
T he next morning Sekebobo brought about
2000 men before my quarters, and requested to
know my will. I told him to despatch 1000 men
to cut long poles 1 inch thick, 3.00 to cut poles
3 inches thick and 7 feet long, 100 to cut
straight long trees 4 inches thick, and 100 to
disbark all these, and make bark rope. Himself
and 500 men I wished to assist me at the beach.
T h e chief communicated my instructions and
urged them to be speedy, as it was the Emperor’s
command, and himself accompanied me
to the canoe fleet.
I selected three o f the strongest-built canoes,
each 70 feet long and 6 y 3 feet wide, and, after
preparing a space o f ground near the water’s
edge, had them drawn up paralled with one
another, and 4 feet apart from each other.
With these three canoes I began to construct a
floating platform, laying the tall trees across
the canoes, and lashing them firmly to the
thwarts, and as fast as the 7-foot poles came,
I had them lashed in an upright position to the
thwarts o f the outer canoes, and as fast as the
inch poles arrived, I had them twisted in among
these uprights, so that, when completed, it resembled
an oblong stockade, 70 feet long by
27 feet wide, which the spears o f the enemy
could not penetrate.
On the afternoon o f the second d a y , the
floating fort was finished, and Mtesa and his
chiefs came down to the beach to see it launched
and navigated for a trial trip. T h e chiefs, when
they saw it, began to say it would sink, and
communicated their fears to Mtesa, who half
believed them. But the Emperor’s women said
to him: “ Leave Stamlee alone; he would not
make such a thing if he did not know that it
would float.”
On receiving orders to launch it, I selected
s ixty paddlers and 150 musketeers o f the b o d y guard
to stand b y to embark as soon as it
should be afloat, and appointed T o r i and one
of my own best men to superintend its navigation,
and told them to close the gate o f the fort as
soon as th ey pushed o ff from the land. A b ou t
1000 men were then set to w o rk to launch it,
and soon it was floating in the water, and when
the crew and garrison, 214 souls, were in it, it
was evident to all that it rode the waves o f the
lake easily and safely—
“ The invention all admired, and each how he
To be the inventor missed, so easy it seemed
Once found, which yet unfound most would have thought
Impossible1’—
and a burst o f applause from the a rm y rewarded
the inventor.
S everal long blue Kaniki and white and red
THROUGH THE DARK CONTINENT. VOL. II.