A White King in East Africa: The Remarkable Adventures of John Boyes, Trader and Soldier of Fortune, Who Became King of the Savage Wa-KikuyuBoyes, John
History
A White King in East Africa: The Remarkable Adventures of John Boyes, Trader and Soldier of Fortune, Who Became King of the Savage Wa-Kikuyu
Boyes, John
Africa, East; Kikuyu (African people)
We had started about 6 p.m., and about five hours’ march brought us to
the village of the next chief, named Caranja, whose looks I did not like
from the first, as he had a most truculent and treacherous appearance,
so that, although he shook hands with me readily when we met, I did not
trust him, and ordered my men to keep a particularly strict guard, and
forbade them to go into any of the villages. We camped outside, and
nothing of note happened, except that the chief was most interested in
my gun, and asked me to fire a few shots at a tree to show him how it
worked—a request with which I complied.
Starting at daybreak the next morning, the chief himself accompanied me
as guide for some distance, and when beyond his jurisdiction I was
surprised to find that the people had all deserted the villages along
our road. I imagine that what had happened was that the chief had sent
messengers on ahead to say that I was coming to fight them and raid
their country; or, possibly, the reason was that I had now got to the
edge of the Kalyera country, and they thought that I had come to inquire
into their behaviour in killing my people and to demand compensation.
Although we shouted to them as we went along that we had not come to
fight them and waved bundles of grass to show that our intentions were
peaceful, none of them would come near us, and we did not interfere with
them.
All the country round was thickly populated and under cultivation, like
the districts we had already passed through. The chief who had been
guiding us had returned to his own village, and we were making very slow
progress through an unknown country when two natives came in sight, whom
we found had been sent by another chief to guide us to his place. They
said it was not very far away, but the native has very little idea of
distance, and I thought we were never going to arrive at his village. I
knew from experience that a native will lead you on for two or three
days with the assurance that you are close to your destination. Our
guides kept telling us that it was just over the next hill, and when we
had got over that it was always just over the next. I was beginning to
get tired, and thought about camping for the night, when the guides
pointed out a village in the distance, which I could just make out with
my glasses, so we continued our journey, and arrived close to the
village about dusk. There was a lot of shouting and hallooing, but we
did not go in and camped close together outside. Practically every man
was on guard that night, as we knew nothing about the people, and could
not be sure that they would be friendly, but though we heard a lot of
shouting during the night nothing happened, and in the morning the chief
came to see me. As soon as I saw him I liked the look of him. He seemed
a young man, though it is very difficult to tell the age of natives—they
never know it themselves—but I took him to be about thirty. He seemed to
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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