Of Course I Refused, Saying It Was Uncourteous To Both
The King And Myself.
Still he persisted, until, finding it
hopeless, he spitefully told N'yamgundu to keep me here at least
two days.
N'yamgundu, however, very prudently told him he should
obey his orders, which were to take me on as fast as he could. I
then gave N'yamgundu wires and beads for himself and all his
family round, which made Maula slink further away from me than
ever.
The buffaloes were very numerous in the tall grasses that lined
the sides and bottoms of the hills; but although I saw some, I
could not get a shot, for the grasses being double the height of
myself, afforded them means of dashing out of view as soon as
seen, and the rustling noise made whilst I followed them kept
them on the alert. At night a hyena came into my hut, and carried
off one of my goats that was tied to a log between two of my
sleeping men.
During the next march, after passing some of the most
beautifully- wooded dells, in which lay small rush-lakes on the
right of the road, draining, as I fancied, into the Victoria
Lake, I met with a party of the king's gamekeepers, staking their
nets all along the side of a hill, hoping to catch antelopes by
driving the covers with dogs and men. Farther on, also, I came
on a party driving one hundred cows, as a present from Mtesa to
Rumanika, which the officers in charge said was their king's
return for the favour Rumanika had done him in sending me on to
him.
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