Another and yet another body of soldiers rushed past them.  Mackay became more and more suspicious that some foul plot was being brewed.  He and his company had walked ten miles, and the lake was but two miles away, divided from them by a wood.  Suddenly there leapt out from behind the trees of the wood hundreds of men headed by Mujasi himself.

They levelled their guns and spears at Mackay and his friends and yelled, “Go back!  Go back!”

“We are the King’s friends,” replied Mackay, “and we have his leave to travel.  How dare you insult us?”

And they pushed forward.  But the soldiers rushed at them; snatched their walking-sticks from them and began to jostle them.  Mackay and Ashe sat down by the side of the path.  Mujasi came up to them.

“Where are you walking?” he asked.

“We are travelling to the port with the permission of King M’wanga and the Katikiro.”

“You are a liar!” replied Mujasi.

Mujasi stood back and the soldiers rushed at the missionaries, dragged them to their feet and held the muzzles of their guns within a few inches of their chests.  Mackay turned with his boys and marched back to the capital.

He and Ashe were allowed to go back to their own home on the side of the hill, but the five boys were marched to the King’s headquarters and imprisoned.  The Katikiro, when Mackay went to him, refused to listen at first.  Then he declared that Mackay was always taking boys out of the country, and returning with armies of white men and hiding them with the intention of conquering Uganda.

The Katikiro waved them aside and the angry waiting mob rushed on the missionaries yelling, “Mine shall be his coat!” “Mine his trousers!” “No, mine!” shouted another, as the men scuffled with one another.

Mackay and Ashe at last got back to their home and knelt in prayer.  Later on the same evening, they decided to attempt to win back the King and the Prime Minister and Mujasi by gifts, so that their imprisoned boys would be freed from danger.

Mackay spoke to his other boys, telling them to go and fly for their lives or they would be killed.

In the morning Mackay heard that three of the boys who had been captured on the previous day were not only bound as prisoners, but that Mujasi was threatening to burn them to death.  The boys were named Seruwanga, Kakumba, and Lugalama.  The eldest was fifteen, the youngest twelve.

The boys were led out with a mob of howling men and boys around them.  Mujasi shouted to them:  “Oh, you know Isa Masiya (Jesus Christ).  You believe you will rise from the dead.  I shall burn you, and you will see if this is so.”

A hideous roar of laughter rose from the mob.  The boys were led down the hill towards the edge of a marsh.  Behind them was a plantation of banana trees.  Some men who had carried bundles of firewood on their heads threw the wood into a heap; others laid hold of each of the boys and cut off their arms with hideous curved knives so that they should not struggle in the fire.