5th, 6th, and 7th January, 1870.—Wettings by rain and grass overhanging our paths, with bad water, brought on choleraic symptoms; and opium from Mohamad had no effect in stopping it: he, too, had rheumatism. On suspecting the water as the cause, I had all I used boiled, and this was effectual, but I was greatly reduced in flesh, and so were many of our party.
We proceeded nearly due north, through wilderness and many villages and running rills; the paths are often left to be choked up by the overbearing vegetation, and then the course of the rill is adopted as the only clear passage; it has also this advantage, it prevents footmarks being followed by enemies: in fact the object is always to make approaches to human dwellings as difficult as possible, even the hedges around villages sprout out and grow a living fence, and this is covered by a great mass of a species of calabash with its broad leaves, so that nothing appears of the fence outside.
11th January, 1870.—The people are civil, but uproarious from the excitement of having never seen strangers before; all visitors from a distance came with their large wooden shields; many of the men are handsome and tall but the women are plainer than at Bambarré.
12th January, 1870.—Cross the Lolindé, 35 yards and knee deep, flowing to join Luamo far down: dark water. (13th.) Through the hills Chimunémuné; we see many albinos and partial lepers and syphilis is prevalent. It is too trying to travel during the rains.
14th January, 1870.—The Muabé palm had taken possession of a broad valley, and the leaf-stalks, as thick as a strong man's arm and 20 feet long, had fallen off and blocked up all passage except by one path made and mixed up by the feet of buffaloes and elephants. In places like this the leg goes into elephants' holes up to the thigh and it is grievous; three hours of this slough tired the strongest: a brown stream ran through the centre, waist deep, and washed off a little of the adhesive mud. Our path now lay through a river covered with tikatika, a living vegetable bridge made by a species of glossy leafed grass which felts itself into a mat capable of bearing a man's weight, but it bends in a foot or fifteen inches every step; a stick six feet long could not reach the bottom in certain holes we passed. The lotus, or sacred lily, which grows in nearly all the shallow waters of this country, sometimes spreads its broad leaves over the bridge so as to lead careless observers to think that it is the bridge builder, but the grass mentioned is the real agent. Here it is called Kintéfwétéfwé; on Victoria Nyanza Titatika.
15th January, 1870.—Choleraic purging again came on till all the water used was boiled, but I was laid up by sheer weakness near the hill Chanza.
20th and 21st January. 1870.—Weakness and illness goes on because we get wet so often; the whole party suffers, and they say that they will never come here again. The Manyango Rivulet has fine sweet water, but the whole country is smothered with luxuriant vegetation.
27th, 29th, and 30th January, 1870.—Rest from sickness in camp. The country is indescribable from rank jungle of grass, but the rounded hills are still pretty; an elephant alone can pass through it—these are his head-quarters. The stalks are from half an inch to an inch and a half in diameter, reeds clog the feet, and the leaves rub sorely on the face and eyes: the view is generally shut in by this megatherium grass, except when we come to a slope down to a valley or the bed of a rill.
We came to a village among fine gardens of maize, bananas, ground-nuts, and cassava, but the villagers said, "Go on to next village;" and this meant, "We don't want you here." The main body of Mohamad's people was about three miles before us, but I was so weak I sat down in the next hamlet and asked for a hut to rest in. A woman with leprous hands gave me hers, a nice clean one, and very heavy rain came on: of her own accord she prepared dumplings of green maize, pounded and boiled; which are sweet, for she said that she saw I was hungry. It was excessive weakness from purging, and seeing that I did not eat for fear of the leprosy, she kindly pressed me: "Eat, you are weak only from hunger; this will strengthen you." I put it out of her sight, and blessed her motherly heart.
I had ere this come to the conclusion that I ought not to risk myself further in the rains in my present weakness, for it may result in something worse, as in Marungu and Liemba.