_Nov. 23._—We halted on the 23rd of November, awaiting the arrival of the land division, and meanwhile built a strong camp. We saw several forms on the opposite side of the Ruiki, in the village of chief Kasongo, but they would not deign to answer us, though our interpreter made frequent attempts to induce them to converse. Our party was only thirty-six in number, including myself, and we had but a few bananas, which had been obtained at Kampunzu. Before we could hope to purchase anything from the natives an intercourse of some kind had to be opened. But the aborigines, for some reason, persisted in their distrustful reserve. However, we waited patiently for the land force until sunset, and all night maintained a strict watch lest our boat should be stolen. _Nov. 24th._—Early on the 24th, no news having as yet arrived of our friends, I manned the boat and rowed some ten miles up the Ruiki river, hoping to find them encamped on the bank waiting for us. The general course of the river, though very winding, was from south-west to north- east. A few miles above its mouth it is filled with snags, and becomes narrow, crooked, and swift, and of an inky colour, from a particular tree, whose branches drop in dense masses into the stream. About 2 P.M. we began to return, and, after rowing hard for about an hour and a half, were approaching our lonely camp when we heard guns being fired rapidly. Unless as a measure of defence there could be no earthly reason why the men in the camp should fire their guns. We therefore urged the crew to full speed, and in a short time were astonished to see the mouth of the Ruiki blocked with canoes filled with savages, launching spears and shooting arrows. With a loud shout we dashed down the last straight reach of the Ruiki, which attracted the attention of the savages, who immediately turned and fled down stream, uttering in harmonious but weird concord their strange war-cries. After first learning that no one was wounded, though there were several sheaves of iron-headed and wooden spears, besides reed arrows, in the camp, we inquired the cause of the attack, and heard with astonishment that the people of Kasongo’s had signalled to all the neighbouring villages that the “Nwema” (white chief) was gone away, and had invited them to arm and man their canoes to get meat before he should return. About thirty canoes, manned by a great number of savages, had entered the Ruiki, and, without listening to warning, had persisted in advancing on the camp, until fired upon. They had been engaged only a few minutes before I appeared. Billali, the youth in charge of the heavy rifle, and my factotum on hunting excursions, had shot a man, who lay dead in the stream. When asked how he dared to use my guns to shoot people, he replied with alarm, “I could not help it, sir, indeed I could not. If I had waited but a little minute, he would have killed me, for he was aiming with his spear only a few feet off!”