Those Arabs who despair of ivory invest their remaining beads and cloth in slaves.

20th September, 1867.—­I had resolved to go to Nsama’s, and thence to Moero to-day, but Hamees sent to say that men had come, and we were all to go with them on the 22nd.  Nsama was so vacillating that I had no doubt but this was best.

Hamees’ wife, seeing the preparations that were made for starting, thought that her father was to be attacked, so she, her attendants, and the guides decamped by night.  Hamees went again to Nsama and got other guides to enable us to go off at once.

22nd September, 1867.—­We went north for a couple of hours, then descended into the same valley as that in which I found Nsama.  This valley is on the slope of the watershed, and lies east and west:  a ridge of dark-red sandstone, covered with trees, forms its side on the south.  Other ridges like this make the slope have the form of a stair with huge steps:  the descent is gradually lost as we insensibly climb up the next ridge.  The first plain between the steps is at times swampy, and the paths are covered with the impressions of human feet, which, being hardened by the sun, make walking on their uneven surface very difficult.  Mosquitoes again; we had lost them during our long stay on the higher lands behind us.

23rd September, 1867.—­A fire had broken out the night after we left Hara, and the wind being strong, it got the upper hand, and swept away at once the whole of the temporary village of dry straw huts:  Hamees lost all his beads, guns, powder, and cloth, except one bale.  The news came this morning, and prayers were at once offered for him with incense; some goods will also be sent, as a little incense was.  The prayer-book was held in the smoke of the incense while the responses were made.  These Arabs seem to be very religious in their way:  the prayers were chiefly to Harasji, some relative of Mohamad.

24th September, 1867.—­Roused at 3 A.M. to be told that the next stage had no water, and we should be oppressed with the midday heat if we went now.  We were to go at 2 P.M.  Hamidi’s wife being ill yesterday put a stop to our march on that afternoon.  After the first hour we descended from the ridge to which we had ascended, we had then a wall of tree-covered rocks on our left of more than a thousand feet in altitude; after flanking it for a while we went up, and then along it northwards till it vanished in forest.  Slept without a fresh supply of water.

25th September, 1867.—­Off at 5.30 A.M., through the same well-grown forest we have passed and came to a village stockade, where the gates were shut, and the men all outside, in fear of the Arabs; we then descended from the ridge on which it stood, about a thousand feet, into an immense plain, with a large river in the distance, some ten miles off.