ot allow him to get access to us, for fear, it
was said, lest the Waganda should know where we were hidden, and enable
Mtesa to send an army to come and snatch us away. As the officer said
he would deliver any message I might wish to send to Uganda, I folded a
visiting-card as a letter to the queen-dowager, intimating that I wished
the two men whom I sent back to Mtesa to be forwarded on to Karague;
but desired that the remainder, who deserted their master in difficulty,
should be placed on an island of the N'yanza to live in exile until some
other Englishman should come to release them; that their arms should
be taken from them and kept in the palace. I said further, that should
Mtesa act up to my desires, I would then know he was my friend,
and other white men would not fear to enter Uganda; but if he acted
otherwise, they would fear lest he should imprison them, or seize their
property of their men. If these deserters escaped punishment, no white
men would ever dare trust their lives with such men again. The officer
said he should be afraid to deliver such a message to Mtesa direct; but
he certainly would tell the queen every word of it, which would be even
more efficacious.

4th.--I bullied Kamrasi by telling him we must go with this moon, for
the benefit of its light whilst crossing the Kidi wilderness; as if
we did not reach the vessels in time for seasonable departure down the
Nile, we should have to wait another year for their return from Khartum.
"What!" said Kamrasi, "does Bana forget my promised appointment that
I would either see him to-day or to-morrow? I cannot do so to-day, and
therefore to-morrow we will certainly meet and bid good-bye." The Gani
men, who came with Bombay, said they would escort us to their country,
although, as a rule, they never cross the Kidi wilderness above once in
two years, from fear of the hunting natives, who make gave of everybody
and everything they see; in other words, they seize strangers, plunder
them, and sell them as slaves. To cross that tract, the dry season
is the best, when all the grass is burnt down, or from the middle of
December to the end of March. I gave them a cow, and they at once killed
it, and, sitting down, commenced eating her flesh raw, out of choice.

5th.--The Kamraviona came to inform us that the king was ready for the
great interview, where we could both speak what we had at heart, for
as yet he had only heard what our servants had to say; and there w