1887.
Aug. 7.
Panga
Falls. A witless, unthinking canoe coxswain took his canoe among the branches in broken water, got entangled, and capsized. Nine out of eleven rifles were recovered; two cases of gunpowder were lost. The Zanzibaris were so heedless and lubberly among rapids that I felt myself growing rapidly aged with intense anxiety while observing them. How headstrong human nature is prone to be, I had ample proofs daily. My losses, troubles, and anxieties rose solely from the reckless indifference to instructions manifested by my followers. On land they wandered into the forest, and simply disappeared, or were stabbed or pierced with arrows. So far we had lost eight men and seventeen rifles.
VIEW OF UTIRI VILLAGE.
On the 8th the caravan had hauled the canoes past Nejambi Rapids, and was camped a few miles below Utiri. The next day we reached the villages, where we found the architecture had changed. The houses were now all gable-roofed and low, and each one surrounded by strong, tall, split log palisades, six feet long, nine inches by four inches wide and thick, of the 1887.
Aug. 8.
Uturi. rubiacæ wood. Constructed in two lines, a street about twenty feet ran between them. As I observed them I was impressed with the fact that they were extremely defensible even against rifles. A dozen resolute men in each court of one of these villages armed with poisoned arrows might have caused considerable loss and annoyance to an enemy.
On the 10th we halted, and foragers were despatched in three different directions with poor results, only two days' rations being procurable. One man, named Khalfan, had been wounded in the wind-pipe by a wooden arrow. The manner he received the wound indicates the perfect indifference with which they receive instructions. While Khalfan examined the plantains above, a native stood not twenty feet away and shot him in the throat with a poisoned arrow. The arrow wound was a mere needle-point puncture, and Dr. Parke attended to him with care, but it had a fatal consequence a few days later.
The 11th was consumed by the river party in struggling against a wild stretch, five miles long, of rapids, caused by numerous reefs and rocky islets, while the land column wound along the river bank on a passable track which led them to Engweddé, where we rejoined them on the 12th. Our day's rate having been broken by the rapids, foragers were again despatched to collect food, and succeeded in procuring three days' rations of plantains. On the 13th we marched to Avisibba, or Aveysheba, a settlement of five large villages, two of which were situate on the upper side of Ruku Creek.
The river column was the first to occupy the villages above the Ruku. A fine open street ran between two rows of low huts, each hut surrounded by its tall palisades. There was a promising abundance in the plantain groves about. The untouched forest beyond looked tall, thick, and old. From the mouth of the creek to the extremity of the villages there was a hundred yards' thickness of primeval forest, through which a native path ran. Between the village and the Aruwimi was a belt of timber fifty yards wide. While 1887.
Aug. 13.
Avisibba. the ferriage was progressing across the creek, the boat-crew was searching eagerly and carefully among the scores of courts for hidden savages, and with rifles projecting before them were burrowing into the plantain groves, and outside the villages.
LEAF-BLADED PADDLE OF AVISIBBA.