ordinary hothouse atmosphere could nourish.
We had certainly seen forests before, but this
scene was an epoch in our lives ever to be
remembered for its bitterness; the gloom enhanced
the dismal misery of our life; the slopping
moisture, the unhealthy reeking atmosphere,
and the monotony of the scenes; nothing but the
eternal interlaced branches, the tall aspiring
stems, rising from a tangle through which we
had to burrow and crawl like wild animals, on
hands and feet. '
About 9 A.M. Tippu-Tib and the Arabs came
to my hut at Wane-Kirumbu. After a long
preamble, wherein he described the hardships
of the march, Tippu-Tib concluded by saying
that he had come to announce his wish that
our contract should be dissolved!
In a moment it flashed on my mind that a
crisis had arrived. Was the Expedition to end
here? I urged with all my powers the necessity
for keeping engagements so deliberately entered
into.
“ It is of no use,” Tippu-Tib replied, “ to have
two tongues. Look at it how you may, those
sixty camps will occupy us at the rate we are
travelling over a year, and it will take as much
time to return. I never was in this forest before,
and I had no idea there was such a place in
the world; but the air is killing my people, it
is insufferable. You will kill your own people
rNov. 16, 1876. -j TIPPU-TIB BREAKS DOWN. 179 LWane-Kirumbu. J
if you go on. They are grumbling every day
more and more. This country was not made for
travel; it was made for vile pagans, monkeys,
and wild beasts. I cannot go farther.”
“ Will Tippu-Tib then return to Nyangwe,
and break his word and bond? What will all
the Arabs at Nyangwe, Mwana Mamba, and
Kasongo’s say when they hear that Tippu-Tib,
who was the first Arab to penetrate Rua, proceeded
only a few days with his friend, and then
returned?”
“ Show me a man’s work, and I will do it.”
“Well, look here, Tippu-Tib. The land on
the west bank of the Lualaba is more open
than this, and the road that Mtagamoyo took
to go to the Lumami is on that side. Though
the land is more open, I hear that the people
are worse there than on this side. However,
we are not Mtagamoyo, and they may behave
better with us. Let us try the other side.
“Now, I will give you choice of two contracts.
Accompany me to the river, and wait while I
transport my people across, and I will give you
500 dollars; or accompany me twenty marches
farther along the west bank, and I will give you
2600 dollars. At the end of that time, if you
see your way clear, I will engage you for
another journey, until I am quite satisfied that
I can go no farther. Provisions will be given