The country here showed all the appearance of a salt-pan; indeed, a quantity of very good salt was collected by one of the men, who thought he could turn an honest bunch of beads with it at Unyanyembe.
Petty tolls were levied on them. Kampama’s deputy required four dotis, and an additional tax of six was paid to the chief of the Kanongo when his town was reached.
The Lungwa River bowls away here toward Tanganyika. It is a quick, tumbling stream, leaping among the rocks and boulders, and in its deeper pools it affords cool delight to schools of hippopotami. The men, who had hardly tasted good water since crossing Lambalamfipa, are loud in its praise. Muanuasere improved relations with the people at the next town by opportunely killing another buffalo, and all took a three days’ rest. Yet another caravan met them, bound likewise for the interior, and adding further particulars about the Englishmen at Unyanyembe. This quickened the pace till they found at one stage they were melting two days of the previous outward journey into one.
Arriving at Baula, Jacob Wainwright, the scribe of the party, was commissioned to write an account of the distressing circumstances of the Doctor’s death, and Chuma, taking three men with him, pressed on to deliver it to the English party in person. The rest of the cortege followed them through the jungle to Chilunda’s village. On the outskirts they came across a number of Wagogo hunting elephants with dogs and spears; but although they were well treated by them, and received presents of honey and food, they thought it better to keep these men in ignorance of the charge.
The Manyara River was crossed, on its way to Tanganyika, before they got to Chikooloo. Leaving this village behind them, they advanced to the Ugunda district, now ruled by Kalimangombi, the son of Mbereke, the former chief, and so on to Kasekera, which, it will be remembered, is not far from Unyanyembe.
The African Elephant.
20th October, 1873.—We will here run on ahead with Chuma on his way to communicate with the new arrivals. He reached the Arab settlement without let or hinderance. Lieutenant Cameron was quickly put in possession of the main facts of Dr. Livingstone’s death by reading Jacob’s letter, and Chuma was questioned concerning it in the presence of Dr. Dillon and Lieutenant Murphy. It was a disappointment to find that the reported arrival of Mr. Oswell Livingstone was entirely erroneous; but Lieutenant Cameron showed the wayworn men every kindness. Chuma rested one day before setting out to relieve his comrades, to whom he had arranged to make his way as soon as possible. Lieutenant Cameron expressed a fear that it would not be safe for him to carry the cloth he was willing to furnish them with, if he had not a stronger convoy, as he himself had suffered too sorely from terrified bearers on his way thither; but the young fellows were pretty well acquainted with native marauders by this time, and set off without apprehension.
And now the greater part of their task is over. The weather-beaten company wind their way into the old well-known settlement of Kwihara. A host of Arabs and their attendant slaves meet them, as they sorrowfully take their charge to the same tembe in which the “weary waiting” was endured before, and then they submit to the systematic questioning which the native traveler is so well able to sustain.
News in abundance was offered in return. The porters of the Livingstone East Coast Aid Expedition had plenty to relate to the porters sent by Mr. Stanley. Mirambo’s war dragged on its length, and matters had changed very little since they were there before, either for better or for worse. They found the English officers extremely short of goods; but Lieutenant Cameron, no doubt with the object of his expedition full in view, very properly felt it a first duty to relieve the wants of the party that had performed this herculean feat of bringing the body of the traveler he had been sent to relieve, together with every article belonging to him at the time of his death, as far as this main road to the coast.