I wanted to engage one hundred and seventy porters, but could only get thirty-six, and thirty animals were found, which were all dead in six months, so I had to leave a part of my things behind, including a greater part of my ammunition and my iron boat. I paid various visits to the hippopotamus haunts, and had my boat uplifted from the water upon the points of two tusks, which made corresponding holes in the bottom. My escort were under the impression that nothing less than one hundred and fifty guns and several cannon would enable them to fight a way through the perils of the interior. I was warned that I must pass through savages who shot with poisoned arrows, that I must avoid trees—which was not easy in a land of forest—that the Wazaramo had forbidden white men to enter their country, that one rhinoceros had killed two hundred men, that armies of elephants would attack my camp by night, and that the hyena was more dangerous than the Bengal tiger—altogether, not a cheerful outlook.
Most of these difficulties were raised by a rascal named Ramji, who had his own ends in view. Being
a Hindoo, he thought I was ignorant of Cutchee; so one day I overheard the following conversation between him and a native.
“Will he ever reach it?” asked the native, meaning the Sea of Ujiji; to which Ramji replied:
“Of course not; what is he that he should pass through Ugogo?” (a province about half way).
So I remarked at once that I did intend to pass Ugogo and also reach the Sea of Ujiji, that I did know Cutchee, and that if he was up to any tricks, I should be equal to him.
On June 26th, 1857, I set out in earnest on a journey into the far interior.
On this journey I had several queer experiences. At Nzasa I was visited by three native chiefs, who came to ascertain whether I was bound on a peaceful errand. When I assured them of my unwarlike intentions, they told me I must halt on the morrow and send forth a message to the next chief, but as this plan invariably loses three days, I replied that I could not be bound by their rules, but was ready to pay for their infraction. During the debate upon this fascinating proposal for breaking the law, one of the most turbulent of the Baloch, who were native servants in my train, drew his sword upon an old woman because she refused to give up a basket of grain. She rushed, with the face of a black Medusa, into the assembly, and created a great disturbance. When that was allayed, the principal chief asked me what brought the white man into their country, and
at the same time to predict the loss of their gains and commerce, land and liberty.
“I am old,” he quoth pathetically, “and my beard is grey, yet I never beheld such a calamity as this.”