We could not get the Sultan's men to chum with the Wanguana proper; they were shy, like wild animals--built their huts by themselves--and ate and talked by themselves, for they felt themselves inferiors; and I had to nominate one of their number to be their chief, answerable for the actions of the whole. Being in the position of "boots" to the camp, the tending of goats fell to their lot. Three goats were missing this evening, which the goatherds could not account for, nor any of their men. Suspecting that they were hidden for a private feast, I told their chief to inquire farther, and report. The upshot was, that the man was thrashed for intermeddling, and came back only with his scars. This was a nice sort of insubordination, which of course could not be endured. The goatherd was pinioned and brought to trial, for the double offence of losing the goats and rough-handling his chief. The tricking scoundrel--on quietly saying he could not be answerable for other men's actions if they stole goats, and he could not recognise a man as his chief whom the Sheikh, merely by a whim of his own, thought proper to appoint--was condemned to be tied up for the night with the prospect of a flogging in the morning. Seeing his fate, the cunning vagabond said, "Now I do see it was by your orders the chief was appointed, and not by a whim of Sheikh Said's; I will obey him for the future;" and these words were hardly pronounced than the three missing goats rushed like magic into camp, nobody of course knowing where they came from. Skirting along the margin of the rising ground overlooking the river, through thick woods, cleared in places for cultivation, we arrived at Thumba Lhere. The chief here took a hongo of three yards merikani and two yards kiniki without much fuss, for he had no power. The pagazis struck, and said they would not move from this unless I gave them one fundo or ten necklaces of beads each daily, in lieu of rations, as they were promised by Ladha on the coast that I would do so as soon as they had made four marches. This was an obvious invention, concocted to try my generosity, for I had given the kirangozi a goat, which is customary, to "make the journey prosperous"--had suspended a dollar to his neck in recognition of his office, and given him four yards merikani, that he might have a grand feast with his brothers; while neither the Sheikh, myself, nor any one else in the camp, had heard of such a compact. With high words the matter dropped, African fashion.