Smiling, I said to Salim, “What you promised me just now is true; you have seen me in less than forty days! But what is the meaning of this? These are independent Manyuema chiefs, who were sent by Tippu-Tib to follow us. They are obeying Tippu-Tib in doing so. Let them alone, Salim, there will be less people for you to look after on the road, you know, because you also will follow us. Don’t you see? There, that will do. Come and get into your canoe, otherwise we shall make two marches before you leave here--and you have promised to catch me, you know, in forty days.” Our move on the 5th was to the large settlement of the Batundu, who owned a flourishing crop of Indian corn, and a splendid plantation of bananas, as yet untouched by any caravan. The rear column men required good feeding to restore them to health, and though meat was unprocurable, bananas and corn were not amiss. Here we halted two days, during which we became aware of certain serious disadvantages resulting from contact with the Manyuema. For these people had contracted the small-pox, and had communicated it to the Madi carriers. Our Zanzibaris were proof against this frightful disease, for we had taken the precautions to vaccinate every member of the expedition on board the _Madura_, in March, 1887. But on the Madis it began to develop with alarming rapidity. Among the Manyuema were two insane women, or rather, to be quite correct, two women subject to spasms of hysterical exaltation, possessed by “devils,” according to their chiefs, who prevented sleep by their perpetual singing during the night. Probably some such mania for singing at untimely hours was the cause of the Major’s death. If the poor Major had any ear for harmony, their inharmonious and excited madhouse uproar might well have exasperated him. The female sympathisers of these afflicted ones frequently broke out into strange chorus with them, in the belief that this method had a soothing effect, while any coercive measures for silencing them only exaggerated their curious malady. Whatever influence the chorus may have had on the nerves of the sufferers, on us, who were more tranquil, it was most distressing. [Sidenote: 1888. Sept. 5. Batundu.]