_April 13th._--Halt. I write this in bed, am in great pain; Dr. Parke informs me I suffer from sub-acute gastritis, which I judge to be something of an inflammation of the stomach; am under the influence of morphia. Last night about 2 A.M. the first symptoms attacked me. A halt has been ordered, which I fear will be a long one. This compulsory pause will be a forced extension of time to those misguided people of the Equatorial Province who may hear of our departure from Kavalli, and who may take this halt as a further grace offered to them. [Sidenote: 1889. April 13. Mazamboni’s.] Now followed, one day after another, days of excessive pain and almost utter weariness of life. The body pined for want of the nourishment that the excoriated stomach invariably rejected. Nothing but milk and water could be taken, and the agony caused by the digestion had to be eased by hypodermic injections of morphia. For the first few days the devoted surgeon enabled me to hope that, through his skilful nursing, I might soon recover, and my mind became active in planning the homeward march, and conceiving every unhappy circumstance attending it, and the necessary measures that should be taken. I supposed Kabba Rega was aware of the retreat of the Pasha and his people, and would do his utmost to oppose our progress, conceded to him in imagination hundreds of rifles, and thousands of spearmen with his allies, who use the long bows of the Wahuma, and fancied that after him we should meet the brave and warlike Wasongora, of whom I had heard in 1875, and then the Wanyankori, with their king named the “Lion,” persecuting the column night and day, and victim after victim dropping from among our living ranks; and then the passage of the Alexandra Nile amid a rain of arrows, to encounter the no less hostile people of Karagwé, assisted by the Waganda, and the column daily decreasing in strength and numbers, until some day, a few, after infinite struggles, would reach Msalala, and tell Mackay, the missionary, the horrible scenes of disaster that had dogged us and finally destroyed us; and lying helpless on my bed, with the murmur of the great camp round about me, all these difficulties, arrayed by the vividness of my imagination, had to be struggled against in some way, and forthwith I lost myself in imaginary scenes of endless fights and strategies along the base of the snowy range, seizing every point of vantage, rushing into a palisaded village, and answering every shot with two of most deadly aim; climbing a hill slope and repelling the enemy with such spleen that they would be glad to cease the persecution. Or at crossing of broad rivers, after a troublous search for the means, the ambuscades protecting the ferry, or forming zeribas with frantic energy, every man and woman assisting, the sharpshooters’ rifles keeping up the incessant and venomous fire; Stairs, Nelson, Jephson, Parke halloing their men with cheering voice, and every one aflame with desire to