On the 31st we came to Kanyenyi, to the great Mtemi—­Magomba’s—­ whose son and heir is Mtundu M’gondeh.  As we passed by the tembe of the great Sultan, the msagira, or chief counsellor, a pleasant grey-haired man, was at work making a thorn fence around a patch of young corn.  He greeted the caravan with a sonorous “Yambo,” and, putting himself at its head, he led the way to our camp.  When introduced to me he was very cordial in his manner.  He was offered a kiti-stool and began to talk very affably.  He remembered my predecessors, Burton, Speke, and Grant, very well; declared me to be much younger than any of them; and, recollecting that one of the white men used to drink asses’ milk (Burton?), offered to procure me some.  The way I drank it seemed to give him very great satisfaction.

His son, Unamapokera, was a tall man of thirty or thereabouts, and he conceived a great friendship for me, and promised that the tribute should be very light, and that he would send a man to show me the way to Myumi, which was a village on the frontier of Kanyenyi, by which I would be enabled to avoid the rapacious Kisewah, who was in the habit of enforcing large tribute from caravans.

With the aid of Unamapokera and his father, we contrived to be mulcted very lightly, for we only paid ten doti, while Burton was compelled to pay sixty doti or two hundred and forty yards of cloth.

On the 1st of April, rising early, we reached Myumi after a four hours’ march; then plunged into the jungle, and, about 2 P.M. arrived at a large ziwa, or pond, situate in the middle of a jungle; and on the next day, at 10 A.M., reached the fields of Mapanga.  We were passing the village of Mapanga to a resting-place beyond the village, where we might breakfast and settle the honga, when a lad rushed forward to meet us, and asked us where we were going.  Having received a reply that we were going to a camping-place, he hastened on ahead, and presently we heard him talking to some men in a field on our right.

In the meantime, we had found a comfortable shady place, and had come to a halt; the men were reclining on the ground, or standing up near their respective loads; Bombay was about opening a bale, when we heard a great rush of men, and loud shouts, and, immediately after, out rushed from the jungle near by a body of forty or fifty armed men, who held their spears above their heads, or were about to draw their bows, with a chief at their head, all uttering such howls of rage as only savages can, which sounded like a long-drawn “Hhaat-uh—­Hhaat-uhh-uhh,” which meant, unmistakably, “You will, will you?  No, you will not!”—­at once determined, defiant, and menacing.