On all sides rolled in grand waves a voluptuous land of sunshine, and plenty, and early summer verdure, cooled by soft breezes from the great equatorial freshwater sea. Isolated hill-cones, similar to that of Rubaga, or square tabular masses, rose up from the beautiful landscape to attract, like mysteries, the curious stranger’s observation, and villages and banana groves of still fresher green, far removed on the crest of distant swelling ridges, announced that Mtesa owned a land worth loving. Dark sinuous lines traced the winding courses of deep ravines filled with trees, and grassy extents of gently undulating ground marked the pastures; broader depressions suggested the cultivated gardens and the grain fields, while on the far verge of the horizon we saw the beauty and the charm of the land melting into the blues of distance. There is a singular fascination about this country. The land would be loved for its glorious diversified prospects, even though it were a howling wilderness; but it owes a great deal of the power which it exercises over the imagination to the consciousness that in it dwells a people peculiarly fascinating also. “How comes it,” one asks, “that this barbarous, uneducated, and superstitious monarch builds upon this height?” Not for protection, surely, for he has smoothed the uneven ground and formed broad avenues to approach it, and a single torch would suffice to level all his fences? Does he, then, care for the charms of the prospect? Has he also an eye to the beauties of nature? Were this monarch as barbarous as other African chiefs whom I had met between Zanzibar and Napoleon Channel, he would have sought a basin, or the slope of some ridge, or some portion of the shores of the lake where his cattle might best graze, and would there have constructed his grass dwellings. But this man builds upon a hill that he may look abroad, and take a large imperial view of his land. He loves ample room; his house is an African palace, spacious and lofty; large clean courtyards surround it; he has spacious quarters for his harem, and courtyards round those; he has spacious quarters for his guards, and extensive courtyards round those; a cane enclosure surrounds all, and beyond the enclosure again is a wide avenue running round the palace fences. His people, great and small, imitate him as much as lies in their power. They are well dressed, and immodesty is a crime in the land. Yet I am still in Africa, and only yesterday, as it were, I saw naked men and naked women. It may be that such a monarch and people fascinate me as much as their land. The human figures in the landscape have, indeed, as much interest for me as the gracious landscape itself. The drums sounded. Mtesa had seated himself on the throne, and we hastened to take our seats.