"At nine A.M. we file out of Bagamoyo in the following order: Four chiefs a few hundred yards in front; next the twelve guides, clad in red robes of Jobo, bearing the wire coils; then a long file of two hundred and seventy strong, bearing cloth, wire, beads, and sections of the _Lady Alice_; after them thirty-six women and ten boys, children of some of the chiefs and boat-bearers, following their mothers and assisting them with trifling loads of utensils, followed by the riding asses, Europeans, and gun-bearers; the long line closed by sixteen chiefs who act as rear-guard, and whose duties are to pick up stragglers, and act as supernumeraries until other men can be procured; in all, three hundred and fifty-six souls connected with the Anglo-American expedition. The lengthy line occupies nearly half a mile of the path which, at the present day, is the commercial and exploring highway into the lake regions. "Edward Pocock acts as bugler, and he has familiarized Hamadi, the chief guide, with its notes, so that, in case of a halt being required, Hamadi may be informed immediately. The chief guide is also armed with a prodigiously long horn of ivory, his favorite instrument, and one that belongs to his profession, which he has permission to use only when approaching a suitable camping-place, or to notify to us danger in the front. Before Hamadi strides a chubby little boy with a native drum, which he is to beat only when in the neighborhood of villages, to warn them of the advance of a caravan, a caution most requisite, for many villages are situated in the midst of a dense jungle, and the sudden arrival of a large force of strangers before they had time to hide their little belongings might awaken jealousy and distrust. "In this manner we begin our long journey, full of hopes. There is noise and laughter along the ranks, and a hum of gay voices murmuring through the fields, as we rise and descend with the waves of the land and wind with the sinuosities of the path. Motion had restored us all to a sense of satisfaction. We had an intensely bright and fervid sun shining above us, the path was dry, hard, and admirably fit for travel, and during the commencement of our first march nothing could be conceived in better order than the lengthy, thin column about to confront the wilderness. [Illustration: A LEADING CITIZEN OF BAGAMOYO.]