How I found Livingstone : $b Travels, adventures, and discoveres in Central Africa, including an account of four months' residence with Dr. LivingstoneStanley, Henry M. (Henry Morton)
History
How I found Livingstone : $b Travels, adventures, and discoveres in Central Africa, including an account of four months' residence with Dr. Livingstone
Stanley, Henry M. (Henry Morton)
Africa, Central -- Description and travel; Livingstone, David, 1813-1873
In the morning I had gone to Sayd bin Salim's tembe, to represent to him
how necessary it was to burn the long grass in the forest of Zimbizo,
lest it might hide any of the enemy; but soon afterwards I had been
struck down with another attack of intermittent fever, and was obliged
to turn in and cover myself with blankets to produce perspiration; but
not, however, till I had ordered Shaw and Bombay not to permit any of my
men to leave the camp. But I was told soon afterwards by Selim that more
than one half had gone to the attack on Wilyankuru with Soud bin Sayd.
About 6 P.M. the entire camp of Zimbizo was electrified with the news
that all the Arabs who had accompanied Soud bin Sayd had been killed;
and that more than one-half of his party had been slain. Some of my own
men returned, and from them I learned that Uledi, Grant's former valet,
Mabruki Khatalabu (Killer of his father), Mabruki (the Little), Baruti
of Useguhha, and Ferahan had been killed. I learned also that they had
succeeded in capturing Wilyankuru in a very short time, that Mirambo
and his son were there, that as they succeeded in effecting an entrance,
Mirambo had collected his men, and after leaving the village, had formed
an ambush in the grass, on each side of the road, between Wilyankuru and
Zimbizo, and that as the attacking party were returning home laden with
over a hundred tusks of ivory, and sixty bales of cloth, and two or
three hundred slaves, Mirambo's men suddenly rose up on each side of
them, and stabbed them with their spears. The brave Soud had fired his
double-barrelled gun and shot two men, and was in the act of loading
again when a spear was launched, which penetrated through and through
him: all the other Arabs shared the same fate. This sudden attack from
an enemy they believed to be conquered so demoralized the party that,
dropping their spoil, each man took to his heels, and after making
a wide detour through the woods, returned to Zimbizo to repeat the
dolorous tale.
The effect of this defeat is indescribable. It was impossible to sleep,
from the shrieks of the women whose husbands had fallen. All night they
howled their lamentations, and sometimes might be heard the groans of
the wounded who had contrived to crawl through the grass unperceived by
the enemy. Fugitives were continually coming in throughout the night,
but none of my men who were reported to be dead, were ever heard of
again.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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