“‘Pay, bana,’ said Chowpereh. ‘It is better to get along quietly in this country. If we were strong enough they would pay us.’
“‘Well, then, Bombay and Asmani, go to Mionvu, and offer him twenty; if he will not take twenty, give him thirty; if he refuses thirty, give him forty; then go up to eighty, slowly; make plenty of talk; not one doti more. I swear to you, I will shoot Mionvu if he demands more than eighty. Go, and remember to be wise.’
“I will cut the matter short. At 9 P. M. sixty-four doti were handed over to Mionvu for the King of Uhha, six doti for himself, and five doti for his sub,—altogether seventy-five doti, a bale and a quarter.
“No sooner had we paid than they began to fight amongst themselves over the booty. At dawn we were on the road, very silent and sad.”
After a four hours’ march, crossing the Kanengi River, they entered the boma of Kahirigi, and were told that the brother of the King of Uhha lived there. This roused the apprehension that another exaction of bonga would be made, despite Mionvu’s assertion that his was the last. The king’s brother demanded thirty doti, or half a bale. Stanley was in a rage, ready and willing to fight and die rather than be “halted by a set of miserable, naked robbers.”
He was also informed that there were five more chiefs about two hours’ distance apart from each other. This intelligence led him to adopt a plan of evading this extortion. Accordingly, arrangements were secretly made for leaving the usual route and taking to the jungle; and though the plan came near being defeated several times, yet at length success crowned the adventurous undertaking, and Stanley “had passed the boundary of wicked Uhha and entered Ukaranga,—an event that was hailed with extravagant shouts of joy.”
He saw inevitable ruin before him if his cloth was to be filched from him at this rate by other chiefs. Beggary or bravery was the alternative. He chose the latter. In a few days afterward he found Livingstone at Ujiji.
CHAPTER CLXVII.
AFRICA—Continued.
THE MONBUTTOO.
DR. SCHWEINFURTH, THE DISCOVERER OF THIS TRIBE — THEIR LOCALITY — THEIR GOVERNMENT — KINGS DOGBERRA AND MUNZA — BONGWA AND HIS WIFE VISIT DR. SCHWEINFURTH — RECEPTION OF SCHWEINFURTH BY IZINGERRIA — PIPES OF THE MONBUTTOO — THEIR ACCURACY OF JUDGMENT — WONDERFUL BEAUTY OF THE COUNTRY — KING MUNZA’S COURT — ARROWS OF THE MONBUTTOO — DRESS AND MARTIAL EQUIPMENTS — NEGLECT OF AGRICULTURE — SPHERE OF THE WOMEN — SUBJECTION OF THE MEN — UNCHASTITY OF BOTH SEXES — THEIR CANNIBALISM.
Dr. G. A. Schweinfurth, a young German explorer, having received a grant of money from the Humboldt Institution in 1868, landed in Egypt and thence penetrated the “heart of Africa.” Following out the footsteps of Sir Samuel Baker, he took a westerly course and passing through the country of Niam-niam (of which there is an account on pages 440-444) he visited the hitherto unknown kingdom of Monbuttoo. His scientific and ethnological discoveries have placed his name among the eminent explorers of the African continent, and the results of his explorations, published under the title, “In the Heart of Africa,” are given to the public in a style that is rarely equalled.