eyes broodingly bent on the ground, only raising them to give the signal to his executioners for the slaughter of some of his subjects. It is told of this sanguinary despot that one day he caused 800 of his people to be killed in his sight, and that he made a ghastly pyramid of the bodies of 20,000 Wasoga prisoners, inhabitants of the opposite shore of the Victoria Nile. The chiefs rejected his eldest son as his successor and chose the mild-eyed Mtesa. The “mild-eyed” signalized his election by killing all his nearest relatives and his father’s best counsellors. He was drunk with power and _pombe_. It was now that Speke and Grant saw him. They describe him as a wretch who was peculiarly liable to fits of frenzy, during which he would order the slaughter of those who were his best friends an hour before, or arming himself with a bundle of spears would go into his harem and throw them indiscriminately among his wives and children. It is said a change came over him by being converted to Mohammedanism. He gave up his drinking and many Pagan practices of his fathers, though still believing in wizards and charms. The Moslem Sabbath is observed and Arabic literature has been introduced. Stanley describes him as a tall slim man of thirty years, with fine intelligent features and an expression in which amiability is blended with dignity. His eyes are “large lustrous and lambent.” His skin is a reddish brown and wonderfully smooth. In council, he is sedate and composed; in private, free and hilarious. Of his intelligence and capacity there can be no question. Nor can it be doubted that he has a sincere liking for white men. His curiosity about civilized peoples, their customs, manufactures and inventions is insatiable, and he seems to have once entertained the idea of modeling his kingdom after a civilized pattern. He showed “Stamlee” (Stanley) and other white visitors the greatest hospitality. Yet there was something cat-like in his caressing and insinuating ways. His smiles and attentions could not be relied on any more than the fawning of the leopard, which the kings of Uganda take for their royal badge. Stanley tried to convert him from his Moslem faith to Christianity. He got so far as to have him write the Ten Commandments for daily perusal and keep the Christian along with the Moslem Sabbath. This was on his first visit. But on his return to Rubaga he found the king had gone to war with the Wavuma. He went along and had excellent opportunity to notice the king’s power. His estimate of Mtesa’s fighting strength on this occasion was an army of 150,000 men, and as many more camp followers in the shape of women and children. There were not less than 500 large canoes, over seventy feet in length, requiring 8500 paddlers. The whole population of his territory he estimated at 3,500,000, and its extent at 70,000 square miles.