I was much interested to find that these people cultivated
coco-nuts, chiefly I am afraid for the manufacture of Membo’’
(toddy) but they also sold some nuts. I also visited a fairly
large plantation situated close to the river, surrounded by some
yery fine forest trees. The coco-nuts were very lanky, being
planted exceedingly close together, and intermingled with
some orange and papaw trees.
I dined with Mr. Burt, whom I was sorry to find not at all
well, and no wonder, as he had to rough it a great deal.
I w a s v e r y sorry to hear of the frequent quarrels prevalent
amongst the -native villagers, chiefly confined to the Wa-
Giryama, fights being the result. No poisoned arrows are,
however,’used in inter-tribal quarrels. I heard of a Giryama
under the influence of “ tembo” splitting open the skull of a
little babe in its mother’s arms. To atone for this the man
would have to give up two men, and it is the difficulty in
obtaining these men that leads to the frequent fights.
A big devil dance took place in the village and went on the
greater part of the night, and prevented me from getting much
i' sleep.
I bade good-bye to Mr. Burt early next morning, the next
stage on my journey being a place called Manzai, said to be
seven hours away, which, I was told, was the nearest place
where we should find water. We camped for breakfast at a
Wanika village on the way and got water from a hole, rested
here an hour and set off again, reaching Manzai late in the
afternoon. This place lies in a lovely hollow, with coco-nuts
(as usual too close) and a charming brook of clear pure water
i — a very great, treat! In the night I heard a leopard growling
close by. ' I went after him, but it was too dark to see
anything;
After a hard tramp over many low hills, and through some
coco-riut cultivation, passing Ribe (London Missionary
Society’s station), three hours from Manzai, I reached Frere
KTown, the seaside station of the Church Missionary Society
; on .Mombasa Harbour, at 3 p.m. Here I had the pleasure of
calling on and having a cup of tea with Bishop Tucker, who
’ was then preparing to start for Uganda.
I remained at Mombasa twelve days, having several impor