Description of the road from Bundegunda—We get a good view of the twin peaks in the Ruwenzori range—March to Utinda—The Pasha’s officers abuse the officer in command: which compels a severe order—Kaibuga urges hostilities against Uhobo—Brush with the enemy: Casati’s servant, Akili, killed—Description of the Ruwenzori range as seen from Nboga—Mr. Jephson still an invalid—The little stowaway named Tukabi—Captain Nelson examines the Semliki for a suitable ferry—We reach the Semliki river: description of the same—Uledi and Saat Tato swim across the river for a canoe—A band of Wara Sura attack us—All safely ferried across the river—In the Awamba forest—Our progress to Baki-kundi—We come across a few Baundwé, forest aborigines—The Egyptians and their followers—Conversation with Emin Pasha—Unexplored parts of Africa—Abundance of food—Ruwenzori from the spur of Ugarama—Two native women give us local information—We find an old man at Batuma—At Bukoko we encounter some Manyuema raiders: their explanation—From Bakokoro we arrive at Mtarega, the foot of the Ruwenzori range—Lieut. Stairs with some men explore the Mountains of the Moon—Report of Lieut. Stairs’ experiences—The Semliki valley—The Rami-lulu valley—The perfection of a tropical forest—Villages in the clearing of Ulegga—Submission of a Ukonju chief—Local knowledge from our friends the Wakonju—Description of the Wakonju tribe—The Semliki river—View of Ruwenzori from Mtsora—We enter Muhamba, and next day camp at Karimi—Capture of some fat cattle of Rukara’s—The Zeriba of Rusessé—Our first view of Lake Albert Edward Nyanza.

1889.
May 9.
Bundegunda.

The road to the south, which we now pursued on moving from Bundegunda on the 9th May, skirted the western base of that great bulk of mountain land inhabited by the Balegga, and the Bandussuma of Mazamboni. It crosses cultivated tracts devoted to beans and luxuriant sweet potatoes, yams, colocassia, and sugar-cane; it is hedged thickly with glorious plantains; it is flanked by humble villages, with cone roofs; it is buried under miniature wildernesses of reedy cane; it dips down to clear, limpid rillets, just escaped from the bosom of the tall mountains soaring above; it winds in snaky curves over rich flats of pasture; it runs close to the foot of steep slopes, and then starts off along smoothly-descending spurs. About five miles off to the westward, or on our right hand, the forest, black as night, keeps company with us. We are seldom out of sight of the advancing capes and receding bays of the dark, eternal mass. On our left, in intimate neighbourhood, rise the mighty slopes, steeply receding upward into the greyish blue of an uncertain sky, and far away, in solemn lines, like a colossal battalion of mountains, is ranged the series between each of which are deep ravines, narrow and far-reaching recessions, formed by ceaselessly-murmuring streams.

1889.
May 10.
Utinda.

On the morning of this day, Ruwenzori came out from its mantle of clouds and vapours, and showed its groups of peaks and spiny ridges resplendent with shining white snow; the blue beyond was as that of ocean—a purified and spotless translucence. Far to the west, like huge double epaulettes, rose the twin peaks which I had seen in December, 1887, and from the sunk ridge below the easternmost rose sharply the dominating and unsurpassed heights of Ruwenzori proper, a congregation of hoary heads, brilliant in white raiment; and away to the east extended a roughened ridge, like a great vertebra—peak and saddle, isolated mount and hollow, until it passed out of sight behind the distant extremities of the range we were then skirting. And while in constant view of it, as I sat up in the hide hammock suspended between two men, my plan of our future route was sketched. For to the west of the twin peaks, Ruwenzori range either dropped suddenly into a plain or sheered away S.S.W. What I saw was either an angle of a mass or the western extremity. We would aim for the base of the twin peaks, and pursue our course southerly to lands unknown, along the base-line. The guides—for we had many now—pointed with their spears vaguely, and cried out “Ukonju” and (giving a little dab into the air with their spear-points) “Usongora,” meaning that Ukonju was what we saw, and beyond it lay Usongora, invisible.

After halting at Ujungwa we rose next day to march to Utinda, seven miles off. The valley between the Balegga Mountains and the forest seemed to narrow, and the path threatened to take us into troublous depths of spear-grass brakes and fens nourishing reed-cane, when, after crossing the Chai and Aturo streams, and several gushing rivulets, it ran up a lengthy spur of the Balegga Mountains, and took us to a height of 500 feet above the valley.

From this altitude we observed that we had narrowly escaped being buried in the forest again, for it had advanced behind the spur right across the valley, and occupied every inch of lowland. Within its sombre depths the Chai and Aturo rivers and other streams united their currents to form a respectable tributary of the Ituri river.

A little to our left, as we looked south, was a deep basin parted into numerous small arable plots, appertaining to the district of Utinda. Every ravine and hollow seemed choked by long, straggling plantations of plantain and banana. The beans and Indian corn were late, for they were not more than five inches high, while at Bundegunda the crops were quite four feet high and in flower.

The Egyptians reached camp four hours after the advance guard, and the officer in charge of the rear complained bitterly of the abuse that he had received from the Pasha’s officers, some of them jeering at him, making mouths, and daring him to drive them along, which compelled me to issue the following order:—

“Whereas the Expedition must necessarily proceed slowly, and shorten its marches, owing to the promise that we have given Selim Bey, and to the fact that the Egyptians, the Soudanese and their followers are as yet unaccustomed to hard travel and fatigue, and to the fact that I, their guide, am physically too weak to endure more than two or three hours’ exertion of any kind, the officers will please exercise the greatest patience and forbearance, but they must on no account forget the duties peculiar to the rear-guard. They will permit no straggling by the wayside, no looting of villages, no indiscriminate pillaging of plantations, no marauding upon any excuse; and upon any insolence, whether from Egyptian officer, private soldier, or follower, the officer in charge will call his guard and bind the offender, and bring him to me for punishment. If any violence is offered it must be met by such violence as will instantly crush it.”