dded to
Katchiba's renown, and after the shower horns were blowing and nogaras
were beating in honor of their chief. Entre nous, my whistle was
considered infallible.

A bad attack of fever laid me up until the 31st of December. On the
first day of January, 1864, I was hardly able to stand, and was nearly
worn out at the very time that I required my strength, as we were to
start south in a few days. Although my quinine had been long since
exhausted, I had reserved ten grains to enable me to start in case the
fever should attack me at the time of departure. I now swallowed my last
dose.

It was difficult to procure porters; therefore I left all my effects at
my camp in charge of two of my men, and I determined to travel light,
without the tent, and to take little beyond ammunition and cooking
utensils. Ibrahim left forty-five men in his zareeba, and on the 5th of
January we started.

In four days' march we reached the Asua River, and on January 13th
arrived at Shooa, in latitude 3 degrees 4'.

Two days after our arrival at Shooa all of our Obbo porters absconded.
They had heard that we were bound for Kamrasi's country, and having
received exaggerated accounts of his power from the Shooa people, they
had determined upon retreat; thus we were at once unable to proceed,
unless we could procure porters from Shooa. This was exceedingly
difficult, as Kamrasi was well known here, and was not loved. His
country was known as "Quanda," and I at once recognized the corruption
of Speke's "Uganda." The slave woman "Bacheeta," who had formerly given
me in Obbo so much information concerning Kamrasi's country, was to
be our interpreter; but we also had the luck to discover a lad who
had formerly been employed by Mahommed in Faloro, who also spoke the
language of Quanda, and had learned a little Arabic.

I now discovered that the slave woman Bacheeta had formerly been in the
service of a chief named Sali, who had been killed by Kamrasi. Sali was
a friend of Rionga (Kamrasi's greatest enemy), and I had been warned
by Speke not to set foot upon Rionga's territory, or all travelling in
Unyoro would be cut off. I plainly saw that Bacheeta was in favor
of Rionga, as a friend of the murdered Sali, by whom she had had two
children, and that she would most likely tamper with the guide, and that
we should be led to Rionga instead of to Kamrasi. There were "wheels
within wheels."

It was now reported that in the last year, immediately aft