I had heard a lot of talk about Wagombi, and was very anxious to visit him and, if possible, make friends with him, as my aim was to get all that country under control and put a stop to the fighting and bloodshed, so that it would be safe for caravans to pass through it and trade. The natives were beginning to see that I had their interests at heart and were beginning to like me. All the way along I had made friends, and I had hopes that, by means of the Pigasangi and blood brotherhood, I might get all the chiefs friendly and at peace with one another. The three ruling chiefs at that time were Karuri, Karkerrie, and Wagombi, and I felt that if I could once get these three to make friends I should soon be able to make the petty chiefs stop their squabbling. I had already got a friendly understanding with the two first-named chiefs, but Wagombi was by far the biggest and most influential of the three, and if I could get him to come in the matter was settled and the country too. My success, so far, was undoubtedly due to my having Kikuyu natives with me as my followers. Without them I should probably never have achieved anything at all, but the fact of my having what were practically their own people with me gave the chiefs I met confidence in me. I parted on the best of terms with Karkerrie, and set out for Wagombi’s country. The country we were now passing through was much more sparsely inhabited, and we camped the first night at the headwaters of the Tana River, where, although no natives came to see me, I took the usual precautions for guarding the camp. Very shortly afterwards these precautions were amply justified, and I was made to realize that I was by no means in an entirely friendly country yet. Some of my men, going down without a guard to fetch water, were attacked by natives, and three of them speared to death. They had evidently been ambushed while going through a shamba by some natives who had immediately cleared off, and, though I made inquiries and found traces of a good many feet in the shamba, the murderers themselves were nowhere visible. We buried the three bodies that afternoon, and had no more disturbance during the night. The next morning we had struck camp for the final stage of the march to Wagombi’s when we saw a lot of natives doing a war-dance and shouting. Going to inquire what it was all about, I found that they had dug up the bodies of the three men we had buried the previous day, and were having a war-dance over them; so, turning away from such a gruesome spectacle, we resumed our march.