I Could Not See Through
So Deep A Scheme And Only Hoped That He Would Shortly Forget, In
The Changes Of The Marching Life, Those Beautiful Wives He Had
Left Behind Him, Which Bombay In His Generosity Tried To Persuade
Me Was The Cause Of His Mental Distraction.
Our halt at the ford here was cut short by the increasing
sickness of the Hottentots, and the painful
Fact that Captain
Grant was seized with fever.[FN#6] We had to change camp to the
little village of Kiruru, where, as rice was grown - an article
not to be procured again on this side of Unyamuezi - we stopped a
day to lay in supplies of this most valuable of all travelling
food. Here I obtained the most consistent accounts of the river
system which, within five days' journey, trends through Uzegura;
and I concluded, from what I heard, that there is no doubt of the
Mukondokua and Wami rivers being one and the same stream. My
informants were the natives of the settlement, and they all
concurred in saying that the Kingani above the junction is called
the Rufu, meaning the parent stream. Beyond it, following under
the line of the hills, at one day's journey distant, there is a
smaller river called Msonge. At an equal distance beyond it,
another of the same size is known as Lungerengeri; and a fourth
river is the Wami, which mouths in the sea at Utondue, between
the ports of Whindi and Saadami. In former years, the ivory-
merchants, ever seeking for an easy road for their trade, and
knowing they would have no hills to climb if they could only gain
a clear passage by this river from the interior plateau to the
sea, made friends with the native chiefs of Uzegura, and
succeeded in establishing it as a thoroughfare. Avarice,
however, that fatal enemy to the negro chiefs, made them
overreach themselves by exorbitant demands of taxes. Then
followed contests for the right of appropriating the taxes, and
the whole ended in the closing of the road, which both parties
were equally anxious to keep open for their mutual gain. This
foolish disruption having at first only lasted for a while, the
road was again opened and again closed, for the merchants wanted
an easy passage, and the native chiefs desired cloths. But it
was shut again; and now we heard of its being for a third time
opened, with what success the future only can determine - for
experience WILL not teach the negro, who thinks only for the
moment. Had they only sense to see, and patience to wait, the
whole trade of the interior would inevitably pass through their
country instead of Uzaramo; and instead of being poor in cloths,
they would be rich and well dressed like their neighbours. But
the curse of Noah sticks to these his grandchildren by Ham, and
no remedy that has yet been found will relieve them. They
require a government like ours in India; and without it, the
slave trade will wipe them off the face of the earth.
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