16th July, 1871.—I restored upwards of thirty of the rescued to their friends: Dugumbé seemed to act in good faith, and kept none of them; it was his own free will that guided him. Women are delivered to their husbands, and about thirty-three canoes left in the creek are to be kept for the owners too.
12 A.M.—Shooting still going on on the other side, and many captives caught. At 1 P.M. Tagamoio's people began to cross over in canoes, beating their drums, firing their guns, and shouting, as if to say, "See the conquering heroes come;" they are answered by the women of Dugumba's camp lullilooing, and friends then fire off their guns in joy. I count seventeen villages in flames, and the smoke goes straight up and forms clouds at the top of the pillar, showing great heat evolved, for the houses are full of carefully-prepared firewood. Dugumbé denies having sent Tagamoio on this foray, and Tagamoio repeats that he went to punish the friends made by Manilla, who, being a slave, had no right to make war and burn villages, that could only be done by free men. Manilla confesses to me privately that he did wrong in that, and loses all his beads and many friends in consequence.
2 P.M.—An old man, called Kabobo, came for his old wife; I asked her if this were her husband, she went to him, and put her arm lovingly around him, and said "Yes." I gave her five strings of beads to buy food, all her stores being destroyed with her house; she bowed down, and put her forehead to the ground as thanks, and old Kabobo did the same: the tears stood in her eyes as she went off. Tagamoio caught 17 women, and other Arabs of his party, 27; dead by gunshot, 25. The heads of two headmen were brought over to be redeemed by their friends with slaves.
3 P.M.—Many of the headmen who have been burned out by the foray came over to me, and begged me to come back with them, and appoint new localities for them to settle in again, but I told them that I was so ashamed of the company in which I found myself, that I could scarcely look the Manyuema in the face. They had believed that I wished to kill them—what did they think now? I could not remain among bloody companions, and would flee away, I said, but they begged me hard not to leave until they were again settled.
The open murder perpetrated on hundreds of unsuspecting women fills me with unspeakable horror: I cannot think of going anywhere with the Tagamoio crew; I must either go down or up Lualaba, whichever the Banian slaves choose.
4 P.M.—Dugumbé saw that by killing the market people he had committed a great error, and speedily got the chiefs who had come over to me to meet him at his house, and forthwith mix blood: they were in bad case. I could not remain to see to their protection, and Dugumbé, being the best of the whole horde, I advised them to make friends, and then appeal to him as able to restrain to some extent his infamous underlings. One chief asked to have his wife and daughter restored to him first, but generally they were cowed, and the fear of death was on them. Dugumbé said to me, "I shall do my utmost to get all the captives, but he must make friends now, in order that the market may not be given up." Blood was mixed, and an essential condition was, "You must give us chitoka," or market. He and most others saw that in theoretically punishing Manilla, they had slaughtered the very best friends that strangers had. The Banian slaves openly declare that they will go only to Lomamé, and no further. Whatever the Ujijian slavers may pretend, they all hate to have me as a witness of their cold-blooded atrocities. The Banian slaves would like to go with Tagamoio, and share in his rapine and get slaves. I tried to go down Lualaba, then up it, and west, but with bloodhounds it is out of the question. I see nothing for it but to go back to Ujiji for other men, though it will throw me out of the chance of discovering the fourth great Lake in the Lualaba line of drainage, and other things of great value.
At last I said that I would start for Ujiji, in three days, on foot. I wished to speak to Tagamoio about the captive relations of the chiefs, but he always ran away when he saw me coming.
17th July, 1871.—All the rest of Dugumbé's party offered me a share of every kind of goods they had, and pressed me not to be ashamed to tell them what I needed. I declined everything save a little gunpowder, but they all made presents of beads, and I was glad to return equivalents in cloth. It is a sore affliction, at least forty-five days in a straight line—equal to 300 miles, or by the turnings and windings 600 English miles, and all after feeding and clothing the Banian slaves for twenty-one months! But it is for the best though; if I do not trust to the riffraff of Ujiji, I must wait for other men at least ten months there. With help from above I shall yet go through Rua, see the underground excavations first, then on to Katanga, and the four ancient fountains eight days beyond, and after that Lake Lincoln.
18th July, 1871.—The murderous assault on the market people felt to me like Gehenna, without the fire and brimstone; but the heat was oppressive, and the firearms pouring their iron bullets on the fugitives, was not an inapt representative of burning in the bottomless pit.
The terrible scenes of man's inhumanity to man brought on severe headache, which might have been serious had it not been relieved by a copious discharge of blood; I was laid up all yesterday afternoon, with the depression the bloodshed made,—it filled me with unspeakable horror. "Don't go away," say the Manyuema chiefs to me; but I cannot stay here in agony.