Most of his men mutinied on the shore of Bangweolo. They complained of the hardships they endured and were tired of munching ears of maize, and demanded that their master should lead them to country where they could get sufficient food. Mild and gentle as always, Livingstone spoke to them kindly. He admitted that they were right, and confessed that he was himself tired of struggling on in want and hardship. They were so astonished at his gentleness that they begged to remain with him. Livingstone was dangerously ill on this journey and had to be carried on a litter. There he lay unconscious and delirious with fever, and lost entirely his count of time. The troop moved again towards Tanganyika, and was to cross the lake in canoes to the Ujiji country on the eastern shore. If he could only get so far, he could rest there, and receive new supplies and letters from home. Worn out and exhausted he at length reached Ujiji, a rendezvous for the Arab slave-dealers. But his fresh supplies had disappeared entirely. He wrote for more from the coast, and urged the Sultan of Zanzibar to see that nothing went astray. He wrote heaps of letters which never reached their destination. A packet of forty-two were sent off at one time, not one of which arrived, for at that time the tribes to the east of the lake were at war with one another. Livingstone did not allow his courage to fail. No difficulties were great enough to crush this man. With Susi and Chuma and a party of newly enlisted porters, he set out westwards across the lake, his aim being to visit the Manyuema country, through the outskirts of which flows the Lualaba. If Livingstone could prove in which direction this mighty river ran, whether to the Mediterranean or the Atlantic, he could then return home with a good conscience. He had determined in his own mind that he would not leave the Dark Continent until he had solved the problem, and for this he sacrificed his life without result. The canoes sped over the lake, and on the western shore he continued his journey on foot to the land of the Manyuemas. He marched on westwards. When the rainy season came on he lost several months, and when he set out again on his next march he had only three companions, two of them being the faithful Susi and Chuma. In the dark thickets of the tropical forests he wounded his feet, dragged himself over fallen trunks and decaying rubbish, and waded across swollen rivers; and among the crowns of the lofty trees and in the dense undergrowth lurked malaria, an invisible miasma. He fell ill again and had to rest a long time in his miserable hut, where he lay on his bed of grass reading his tattered Bible, or listening to the native's tales of combats with men and apes, for gorillas lived in the forests.