Spends Christmas at Zingeh — The Rainy Season Sets In — Famine or Scarcity of Food — Half-Rations — Extortionate Chiefs Levy Blackmail — Arrival at Jiweni — Through Jungle to Kitalalo — The Plain of Salina — “Not a Drop of Water” — Bellicose Natives — Trouble with Many of his Followers — Valuable Services Rendered him by Frank and Edward Pocock and Frederick Barker — Frequent Quarrels — The Trials of Stanley — Camp at Mtiwi — Terrible Rain Storm, and Sad Plight of Stanley and his People — Misled by his Guide, is Lost in a Wild of Low Scrub and Brush — Terrible Experiences — Starvation Impending — Sends for Relief to Suna in Urimi — The Welcome Meal of Oatmeal — A Singular Cooking Utensil — Death of Edward Pocock — The Weary March from the Warimi to Mgongo Tembe — The Beautiful Usiha — Reaches Victoria Nyanza February 27th, 1875 — Enters Kagehyi — Receives its Hospitalities — The End of a Journey of 720 miles in 103 days.
The route of Stanley’s march from Mpwapwa took in Chunyu, Kikombo, Itumbi, Mpamira’s village, Lechumwa, Dudoma, and Zingeh, spending Christmas day at the latter place. The rainy season had set in and the condition of the explorer and his men was aught but agreeable, as appears by a letter written to a friend on Christmas day. He says, “It has been raining heavily the last two or three days, and an impetuous down-pour of sheet rain has just ceased. On the march, rain is very disagreeable; it makes the clayey path slippery, and the loads heavier by being saturated, while it half ruins the clothes. It makes us dispirited, wet and cold, added to which we are hungry—for there is a famine or scarcity of food at this season, and therefore we can only procure half-rations.”... “The natives have but little left. I myself have not had a piece of meat for ten days.”... “I weighed 180 pounds when I left Zanzibar, but under this diet I have been reduced to 134 pounds within thirty-eight days. The young Englishmen are in the same impoverished condition of body, and unless we reach some more flourishing country than Ugogo, we must soon become mere skeletons.
“Besides the terribly wet weather and the scarcity of food, we are compelled to undergo the tedious and wearisome task of haggling with extortionate chiefs over the amount of blackmail which they demand and which we must pay. We are compelled, as you may perceive, to draw heavy drafts on the virtues of prudence, patience and resignation, without which the transit of Ugogo under such conditions as above described, would be most perilous.”
The next camp westward of Zingeh was established at Jiweni, at an altitude of 3150 feet above sea-level. From here through a scrubby jungle to Kitalalo. From Kitalalo to the broad and almost level Salina, which stretches from Mizanza to the south of the track to the hills of Uyangwira, north. The greatest breadth of the plain of Salina is twenty miles, and its length may be estimated at fifty miles. The march across this plain was very fatiguing. Not a drop of water was discovered on the route, though towards the latter part of the journey a grateful rain-shower fell, which revived the caravan, but converted the plain into a quagmire.
“On approaching the Mukondoku district,” says Stanley, “we sighted the always bellicose natives advancing upon our van with uplifted spears and noisy show of war. This belligerent exhibition did not disturb our equanimity, as we were strangers and had given no cause for hostilities. After manifesting their prowess by a few harmless boasts and much frantic action, they soon subsided into a more pacific demeanor, and permitted us to proceed quietly to our camp under a towering baobab near the King’s village.”
In speaking, also, of his followers at this time, it appears that the explorer experienced considerable trouble with some of them. He pays great compliments for the invaluable services rendered him by Frank and Edward Pocock and Frederick Barker in endeavoring to harmonize the large, unruly mob, with its many eccentricities and unassimilating natures.
“Quarrels were frequent,” he says, “sometimes dangerous, between various members of the expedition, and at such critical moments only did my personal interference become imperatively necessary. What with taking solar observations and making ethnological notes, negotiating with chiefs about the tribute moneys and attending to the sick, my time was occupied from morning till night. In addition to all this strain on my own physical powers, I was myself frequently sick from fever, and wasted from lack of proper, nourishing food; and if the chief of an expedition be thus distressed, it may readily be believed that the poor fellows depending on him suffer also.”
On the 1st of January, 1875, Stanley struck north, thus leaving for the first time the path to Unyanyembe, the common highway of East Central Africa. The next halt was made at Mtiwi, the chief of which was Malewa. “The last night spent at this place was a disturbed one,” says Stanley; “the flood-gates of heaven seemed literally opened for a period. After an hour’s rainfall, six inches of water covered our camp, and a slow current ran southerly. Every member of the expedition was distressed, and even the Europeans, lodged in tents, were not exempt from the evils of the night. My tent walls enclosed a little pool, banked by boxes of stores and ammunition. Hearing cries outside, I lit a candle, and my astonishment was great to find that my bed was an island in a shallow river, which, if it increased in depth and current, would assuredly carry me off south towards the Rufiji. My walking-boots were miniature barks, floating to and fro on a turbid tide seeking a place of exit to the dark world of waters without. My guns, lashed to the centre pole, were stock deep in water. But the most comical sight was presented by Jack and Bull, perched back to back on the top of an ammunition box, butting each other rearward, and snarling and growling for that scant portion of comfort.
“In the morning I discovered my fatigue cap several yards outside the tent, and one of my boots down south. The harmonium, a present for Mtesa, a large quantity of gunpowder, tea, rice and sugar, were destroyed. Vengeance appeared to have overtaken us. At 10 A. M. the sun appeared, astonished, no doubt, at a new lake formed during his absence. By noon the water had considerably decreased, and permitted us to march, and with glad hearts we surmounted the upland of Uyanzi, and from our busy camp, on the afternoon of January 4th, gazed upon the spacious plain beneath, and the vast broad region of sterility and thorns which we had known as inhospitable Ugogo.”
On the 6th of January, Stanley reached Kashongwa, a village situated on the verge of a trackless wild, peopled by a mixture of Wasukuma, renegade Wangwana, and Wanyamwezi. Informed here that he was but a two days’ march from Urimi, and having yet two days’ rations, he resumed the march under the guidance of one of these people, along a route that was said would bring him to Urimi the day after. The experiences of Stanley and his people during the following four days can be best conceived from a perusal of his own words.