The order for the halt was no sooner given than the bearers set about their wonted work, and labouring with their knives and hatchets soon procured from the jungles by the brook the supply of material sufficient for our architectural needs. Rapidly as ever our encampment was reared: hardly an hour elapsed before our place of sojourn was in order, with a gorgeous landscape opening in its front, and this time in view of the royal abode of an African monarch. My own tent, which began to exhibit only too plainly the tokens of being somewhat weather-beaten by repeated exposure, was located in the very midst of the lines of our grass-huts: not now was it erected, as often it had been, upon the bare rock of a desolate wilderness, but in the centre of a scene of surpassing beauty: for the first time I had it decorated with my flag, which waved proudly above it in honour of our arrival at the court of so distinguished and powerful a prince.
The natives lost no time in crowding in and endeavouring to obtain an interview. But it suited my inclination to withdraw myself for a time. I remained in the retirement of my tent simply because I was weary of these interviews, which always necessitated my permitting either my head to be handled, in order to convince them that the long straight hair was really my own, or my bosom (like Wallenstein’s when he fronted his murderers) to be bared that they might admire its whiteness. I was thus induced to remain under shelter, and meanwhile the Monbuttoo magnates waited patiently or impatiently without; they had brought their benches, which they placed close to my quarters, but I continued obstinate in my determination to be undisturbed, resolved to reserve all my strength and energy for the following day, when I should have to exhibit the marvel of my existence before King Munza himself.
FOOTNOTES:
[47] ‘Troglodytes Schweinfurthii Gigl. in Studii Craniologici sui Cimpanze.’ Genova, 1872.
[48] Reichert’s and Du Bois Raymond’s ‘Archiv.’ Berlin, 1872.
[49] The A-Madi must not be confounded with the Madi of the Mittoo, nor with the Madi south of Gondokoro. In the native dialect “a” is only a plural form: e.g., “ango” means a dog; “a-ango,” dogs.
[50] The measurements are given in the sketch-map in Vol. II.
END OF VOL. I.
LONDON:
PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS,
STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING CROSS.