After an hour and thirty minutes’ march I entered Mb’hali, the normal cultivator’s village in Western Unyamwezi;--a heap of dwarf huts like inverted birds’ nests surrounding a central space, and surrounded by giant heaps of euphorbia or milk-bush. Tall grasses were growing almost up to the door-ways, and about the settlement were scattered papaws and plantains; the Mwongo, with its damson-like fruit, the Mtogwe or wood-apple tree, and the tall solitary Palmyra, whose high columnar stem, with its graceful central swell, was eminently attractive. We did not delay at Mb’hali, whence provisions had been exhausted by the markets of Msene. The 11th January led us through a dense jungle upon a dead flat, succeeded by rolling ground bordered with low hills and covered with alternate bush and cultivation, to Sengati, another similar verdure-clad village of peasantry, where rice and other supplies were procurable. On the 12th January, after passing over a dead flat of fields and of the rankest grass, we entered rolling ground in the vicinity of the Gombe Nullah, with scattered huts upon the rises, and villages built close to the dense vegetation bordering upon the stream. Sorora or Solola is one of the deadliest spots in Unyamwezi; we were delayed there, however, three long days, by the necessity of collecting a two months’ supply of rice, which is rarely to be obtained further west. The non-appearance of the sons of Ramji rendered it necessary to take a strong step. I could ill afford the loss of twelve guns, but Kidogo and his men had become insufferable: moreover, they had openly boasted that they intended to prevent my embarking upon the “Sea of Ujiji.” Despite therefore the persuasions of the Jemadar and Said bin Salim, who looked as if they had heard their death-warrants, I summoned the slaves, who first condescended to appear on the 13th January--three days after my departure,--informed them that the six months for which they were engaged and paid had expired, and that they had better return and transact their proprietor’s business at Kazeh. They changed, it is true, their tone and manner, pathetically pleaded, as an excuse for their ill conduct, that they were slaves, and promised in future to be the most obedient of servants. But they had deceived me too often, and I feared that, if led forwards, they might compromise the success of the exploration. They were therefore formally dismissed, with a supply of cloth and beads sufficient to reach Kazeh, a letter to their master, and another paper to Snay bin Amir, authorising him to frank them to their homes. Kidogo departed, declaring that he would carry off perforce, if necessary, the four donkey-drivers who had been engaged and paid for the journey to the “Sea of Ujiji” and back: as two of these men, Nasibu and Hassani, openly threatened to desert, they were at once put in irons and entrusted to the Baloch. They took oaths on the Koran, and, by strong