"Mrima" landward from the southern river - plain. The people assured us that the rolling surface above supports an abundant population of Washenzy, clients and serfs to Sultan Kimwere's clan.

We then entered upon cultivated ground, which seemed a garden after the red waste below Tongway. Cocos and tall trees concealed the stream, which, above its junction with the Luangua, is a mere mountain-torrent, roaring down a rocky tortuous bed, and forming green-tufted islets, which are favourite sites for settlements. Our guides presently took leave, pretexting a blood-feud with the neighbouring villages. The people, as we passed by, flocked over their rude bridges, a floor of narrow planks laid horizontally upon rough coco-piers, forked upright, planted a few feet apart, parapeted with rough basketwork, and sometimes supplied with knotty fibrous creepers to stay the travellers' steps. These the number and daring of the alligators render necessary. Artless constructions, they are the puentes de cimbra of Chili, and much resemble the bridges of inner Devonshire during the days of our grandfathers. Cows, goats, and longtailed sheep clustered upon the plains. Halting for the noon under a spreading tamarind, we were surrounded by crowds, who feasted their eyes upon us for hours together. They were unarmed, dressed in hides, spoke the Kizegura dialect, which differs greatly from Kisawahili, and appeared rather timid than dangerous. The Sultan of the Zafura village, near which we reposed, stalked about, spear in hand, highly offended by our not entering his hut; and some Sawahilis in red caps looked daggers at the white strangers. We tried to hire extra porters; but having no merikan (domestics), and no beads, we notably failed.

Presently black Nimbi capped the hill-tops, cooling the fierce Simum, and low thunders warned us forward. Resuming our march at 3.30 P.M., we crossed a dry finmara, trending towards the Lufu; traversed a hill-spur of rolling and thorny red ground, to avoid a deep bend in the stream; passed a place where the divided waters, apparently issuing from a

wooded rock, foam over the jagged incline; and at 5 P.M., passing two bridges, we entered Msiky Mguru, a Wazegura village distant twelve miles from Kohoday. It is a cluster of hay-cock huts, touching one another, built upon an island formed by divers rapid and roaring branches of the river. The headman was sick, but we found a hospitable reception. Uninitiated in the African secret of strewing ashes round the feet of the Kitandah or Cartel, although eschewing the dirty smoky huts, we spent our night with ants, and other little murderers of sleep which shall be nameless. Our hosts expressed great alarm about the Masai. It was justified by the sequel. Scarcely had we left the country when a plundering party of wild spearmen attacked two neighbouring villages, slaughtered the hapless cultivators, and with pillage and pollage drove off the cows in triumph. They watched with astonishment the magical process of taking an altitude of Canopus, and were anxious to do business in female slaves, honey, goats, and sheep. Some of the girls were rather comely: they did not show the least fear or shame.

At sunrise on the next morning we resumed our march, following the left bank of the river, which is here called Kirna. For about three miles it is a broad line of flat boulders, thicket, sedge, and grass, with divers trickling rivulets between. At the Maurwi village, the branches anastomoze, forming a deep and strong but navigable stream, about thirty yards broad, and hedged with masses of vegetation. Thence we turned northward, over rolling red clay, here cultivated, there a thorny jungle, in the direction of Tamota, another mural precipice and bluff headland in the hill curtain of Usumbara. The paths were crowded with a hide-clad and grass-kilted race, chiefly women and small girls, who, by the by, displayed very precocious developments, leading children each with a button of hair left upon its scraped crown. The adults, laden with manive, holcus, and maize, poultry, sugar-cane, and waterpots with bunches of leaves to prevent splashing, with pumpkins and plantains-here their own land

begins were bound for a Golio, or market held in an open plain. None evinced fear of a white face; but when our Belochies asked the fair how they would like us for husbands, they simply replied, "Not at all." The men chip their teeth to points, and, as in Usumbara, punch out in childhood one incisor of the lower jaw a piece of dried rush or sugarcane distends the ear-lobe to an unsightly size. All carried bows and arrows. Some shouldered such hoes and hatchets as English children use upon the sands: here bounteous earth, fertilised by the rains of heaven, requires the mere scratching of a man's nails. Others led stunted pariah dogs adorned with leather collars they are prime favourites with the savages, who hold a stew of puppies, as amongst us in the days of Charles the Second, a dish fit for a monarch. In West Africa also the meat is admired, and some missionaries have described it as "very sweet." The salutations of these savages provoked the wrath of Seedy Bombay. Acquaintances stood afar off and nosed forth hem and hum till they relieved their minds. None, even the women, refused to greet us; and at times Yambo, "the state! was uttered simultaneously by a score of sable lips.

Having duly stared and been stared at, we unloaded for rest at 9.30 A.M. under a spreading tree, near the large double-fenced village of Paslunga belonging to one of Sultan Kimwere's multitudinous sons. Again clouds obscured the air, and thunder growled over the near hills. It became evident that the wet season was fast approaching.

The coolness of the air drew cries of "Safar! Safar !"-let us march !— from the Belochies. At 1.20 P.M. we resumed our way, and presently passed on the left hand a tank of mire and water, thinly sprinkled with paddy-birds, sandpipes, and Egyptian geese, exceedingly wild. Hornbills screamed upon the neighbouring trees, and on the mud my companion shot a specimen of the gorgeous crested crane, whose back-feathers would have made fine bonnets. After an hour's march we skirted a village, where the people peremptorily order

ed us to halt. We attributed this annoyance to Wazira, who was forthwith visited with a general wigging. It is, however, partly the custom of the country. Man here claims a right to hear news, the pabulum which his soul loves, from his neighbour. To coin the most improbable nonsense, to be told lies, and to retail lies, are the mental luxuries of idle men, equally the primum mobile of a Crimean "shave" and of an East African palaver. But the impending rain sharpened our tempers; we laughed in the faces of our angry expostulators, and, bidding them stop us if they could, pursued our road.

Presently ascending a hill, and turning abruptly to the north-east, we found ourselves opposite, and about ten miles distant from, a tall azure curtain, the mountains of Fuga. Below, the plain was populous with hay-cock villages. Tall tamarinds, the large-leaved plantain, and the parasol-shaped papaw, grew wild amongst the thorny trees. Water stood in black pools, and around it waved luxuriant sugar-canes. In a few minutes every mouth in the party was tearing and chewing at a long pole. This cane is of the edible kind the officinal varieties are too luscious, cloying, and bilious, to be sucked with impunity by civilised men. After walking that day sixteen miles, at about 4 P.M. a violent storm of thunder, lightning, and raw south-west wind, which caused the thermometer to fall many degrees, and the slaves to shudder and whimper, drove us back into the Bandany or Palaver-house of a large village. It consisted only of a thatch roof propped by rough uprights. The inside was half-mud half-mould; the only furniture stone slabs, used as hones; and hollowed logs, once beehives and now seats. The place swarmed with flies and mosquitos. We lighted fires to keep off fevers. Our Belochies, after the usual wrangle about rations, waxed melancholy, shook their heads, and declared that the Kusy, or wet monsoon, had set in.

Sunday the 15th of February dawned with one of those steady little cataclysms, which, to be seen advantageously, must be seen near the Line. At 11 A.M. weary of the steaming

Bandany, our men, loaded, and in a lucid interval, set out towards the Fuga hills. As we approached them, the rain shrank to a spitting, gradually ceased, and was replaced by that reeking fetid sepulchral heat which travellers in the tropics know and fear. The path lay over the usual red clay; crossed low ground, where trees decayed in stagnant water, and spanned a cultivated black plain at the foot of the mountains, with a vista of far blue hill on the right. We rested a few minutes before attempting the steep incline before us. The slippery way had wearied our slaves, though aided by three porters hired that morning; and the sun, struggling through vapours, was still hot enough to overpower the whole party.

At 1 P.M. we proceeded to breast the pass. The path began, gently rising over decayed foliage, amongst groves of coarse bananas, whose leaves of satiny lustre, shredded by the winds, hid large bunches of green fruit. The musa is probably an aboriginal of East Africa: it grows, I am told, almost spontaneously upon the shores of the far inner lakes. Here the fruit, which, maturing rapidly, affords a perennial supply, is the staff of savage life. As usual when men are compelled to utilise a single object, they apply the plantain to various purposes. Even the leaves are converted into spoons, plates, and even bottles. They are also made into thatch, fuel, and a substitute for wrapping-papers. Never transplanted, and the rotation of crops being unknown, this banana has now degenerated.

Issuing from the dripping canopy, we followed a steep goat-track, forded a crystal burn, and having reached the midway, sat down to enjoy the rarified air, and to use the compass and spyglass. The view before us was extensive, if not beautiful. Under our feet the mountains fell in rugged folds, clothed with plantain fields, wild mulberries, custard apples, and stately trees, whose lustrous green glittered against the ochreous ground. The salsaparilla vine hung in clusters from the supporting limbs of the tamarind, the toddy palm raised its fantastic arms over the

dwarf coco, and bitter oranges mingled pleasant scent with herbs not unlike mint and sage. Below, half veiled by rank steams, lay the yellow Nika or Wazegura wilderness, traversed by a serpentine of trees denoting the course of the Mkomafi affluent. Three cones, the "Mbara Hills," distant about eight miles, crowned the desert. Far beyond we could see the wellwooded line of the Lufu river, and from it to the walls of the southern and western horizon stretched a uniform purple plain.

We were startled from rest by a prodigious hubbub. The three fresh porters positively refused to rise unless a certain number of cloths were sent forward to propitiate the magnates of Fuga. This was easily traced to Wazira, who received a hint that such trifling might be dangerous. He had been lecturing us all that morning upon the serious nature of our undertaking. Sultan Kimwere was a potent monarch-not a Momba. His ministers" and councillors would, unless well paid, avert from us their countenances; we must enter with a discharge of musketry to awe the people, and by all means do as we are bid. The Belochies smiled contempt, and, pulling up the porters, loaded them, deaf

to remonstrance.

Resuming our march after a short halt, we climbed rather than walked, with hearts beating from such unusual exercise, up the deep zigzag of a torrent. Villages then began to appear perched like eyries upon the hill-tops, and the people gathered to watch our approach. At 4 P.M. we found ourselves upon the summit of a ridge. The Belochies begged us to taste the water of a spring hard by. It was icy cold, with a perceptible chalybeate flavour, sparkled in the cup, and had dyed its head with rust. East Africa is a "land whose stones are iron," and the people declare that they have dug brass.

We now stood upon the mountains, but we found no table-land. The scenery reminded my companion of Almnah, one of the Blue mountains in

Southern India. There were the same rounded cones, tapestried with velvety grass, and ribboned with paths of red clay; the same Sholahs

or gloomy forest-patches clothing the slopes; the same emerald swamps, through which transparant runnels continually trickle, and little torrents and rocky linns. This granite and sandstone heap has, however, a double aspect; the northern and eastern slopes are bluff and barren, whilst the southern and western abound in luxuriant vegetation. The reeking plains westward are well wooded. We were shown the "water of Masinde," a long narrow tank, upon whose banks elephants are said to exist. North-westward the mountains rise apparently higher and steeper, till about ten miles further west, where, capped with cloud-heaps, the giant flanks of Mukumbara bound the view. We stood about four thousand feet above the sea-level, distant thirty-seven miles from the coast, and seventy-four or seventy-five along the winding river. There is a short cut from Kohoday across the mountains; but the route was then waterless, and the heat would have disabled our Belochies.

After another three-mile walk along the hill flanks, we turned a corner and suddenly sighted, upon the opposite summit of a grassy cone, an unfenced heap of hay-cock huts - Fuga. As we drew near, our Belochies formed up and fired a volley, which brought the hind and his wife, and his whole meine, out of the settlement. This being one of the cities where ingress is now forbidden to strangers, we were led by Wazira through timid crowds that shrank back as we approached, round and below the cone to four tattered huts, which superstition assigns as the travellers bungalow." Even the son and heir of great Kim were must abide here till the lucky hour admits him to the presence and the imperial city. The cold rain and sharp rarified air rendering any shelter acceptable, we cleared the huts of sheep and goats, housed our valuables, and sent Seedy Bombay to the Sultan, requesting the honour of an interview.

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Before dark appeared three bareheaded mdue, or "ministers," who in long palaver declared that council must squat upon two knotty points, -Primo, Why and wherefore we

had entered the country vid the hostile Wazegura? Secundo, What time might be appointed by his majesty's Mganga, or medicine-man, for the ceremony. Sharp-witted Hamdan at once declared us to be European wizards, and waganga of peculiar power over the moon and stars, the wind and rain. Away ran the ministers to report the wonder. Whilst they are absent, I will briefly explain what a Mganga is.

The Mganga, who is called by the Arabs Tabib, or doctor, and by us priest, physician, divine, magician, and medicine man, combines, as these translations show, priestly with medical functions. He may be considered the embryo of a sacerdotal order amongst the embryo communities of savage tribes. Siberia has Shamans, and Greenland Angekoks, Guiana her Peïmans, and the North Americans their mystery-men; the Galla believes in his Kaleshah, the Kru Republic in her Deyabos; the West African negro in his Grugru or Fetiss seers, and the Cape Kaffirs in witch doctors, the great originators of all our troubles. Rain-charming is the popular belief of Africa, from Zanzibar to the Kru coast. It is not confined to these barbarous lands. In Ireland, the owner of a four-leaved shamrock can cause or stop showers and the Fins on board our ships deal with the clerk of the weather for fair wind. The Indian Yogi, the Bayragi, and the Sita Rami have similar powers. I heard of a man at Porebunder, who, when torrents of rain injured the crops, was threatened by his Rajah with a "cotton coat ;" that is to say, a padded poncho, well oiled and greased, girt closely round him, and set on fire. In East Africa, from the Simuli country southwards, the rains which appear so wearisome to the traveller are a boon to the savage, who, during droughts, sees his children and cattle perish of hunger and thirst. The demand produces a supply of intellectuals, who, for the consideration of idle life, abundant respect, and food without toil, boldly assert command over the clouds. It is easy to predict rain in these regions. The incantation is delayed till mists gather upon the mountain-tops, and the fetiss is

finished as the shower begins to fall. Success brings both solid pudding and empty praise; failure, the trifling inconvenience of changing air.

The Mganga has various other duties. He must sprinkle the stranger with the blood of sheep and medicines, the aspersory being a cow's tail. Upon the departing guest he gently spits, bidding him go in God's peace. During sickness he must dispose of the ghost or haunting fiend. He marks ivory magically, to insure its reaching the coast in safety. If the Sultan loses health, he fixes upon the bewitcher; and unless duly fee'd, shoves into his mouth a red-hot hatchet, which has no power to burn innocence. The instrument of his craft is a bundle of small sticks. Thrown upon the ground, they form the divining figures; hence the Arabs translate Uganga, "the art," by Raml or Geomancy. Most of these men are open to the persuasions of cloth and beads. One saw the spirit of a white-face sitting in a chair brought as a present to his chief, and broadly insinuated that none but the wise deserved such chair. But let not the reader suppose that all are pure impostors; like supernaturalists in general, they are half deceived and half deceivers. Like the most of mankind, they are partly fools and partly knaves. There is, indeed, no folly conceivable by the mind of man in which man has not firmly and piously believed. And when man lays down life in testimony to his belief, the act rather argues the obstinacy of the martyr than proves the truth of his

tenets.

At 6 P.M. the ministers ran back and summoned us to the "Palace." They led the way through rain and mist to a clump of the usual huts, half hidden by trees, and overspreading a little eminence opposite to and below Fuga. We were allowed but three Belochies as a tail. Their matchlocks were taken away, and a demand was made for our swords, which of course we insisted upon retaining.

Sultan Kimwere half rose from his cot as we entered, and motioned us to sit upon dwarf stools before him. He was an old, old man, emaciated by sickness. His head was shaved, his face beardless, and wrinkled like a grandam's; his eyes were red, his jaws disfurnished, and his hands and feet were stained with leprous spots. The royal dress was a Surat cap, much the worse for wear, and a loinwrap as tattered. He was covered with a doubled cotton-cloth, and he rested upon a Persian rug, apparently coeval with himself. The hut appeared that of a simple cultivator, but it was redolent of dignitaries, some fanning the Sultan, others chatting, and all holding long-stemmed pipes with small ebony bowls. Our errand was inquired, and we were welcomed to Fuga. As none could read the Sazzid of Zanzibar's letter, I was obliged to act secretary. The Centagenarian had heard of our scrutinising stars, stones, and trees he directed us at once to compound a draught which would restore him to health, strength, and youth. I replied that our drugs had been left at Pangany. He signified that we might wander about the hills and seek the plants required. After half an hour's conversation, Hamdan being interpreter, we were dismissed with a renewal of welcome. On our return to the hovels, the present was forwarded to the Sultan with the usual ceremony. We found awaiting us a fine bullock, a basketful of sima-young Indian corn pounded and boiled to a thick hard paste; and balls of unripe bananas, peeled and mashed up with sour milk. Our Belochies instantly addressed themselves to the making of beef, which they ate with such a will, that unpleasant symptoms presently declared themelves in camp. We had covered that day ten miles-equal, perhaps, to thirty in a temperate climate. The angry blast, the groaning trees, and the lashing rain, heard from within a warm hut, affected us pleasurably. We slept the sweet sleep of travellers.

VOL. LXXXIII.-NO. DXI.

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