Another custom is that none dare wear the skin of the musk cat, Ngawa,
unless he has murdered somebody: guns alone prevent them from killing us
all, and for no reason either.

_16th January, 1871._--Ramadân ended last night, and it is probable my
people and others from the coast will begin to travel after three days
of feasting. It has been so rainy I could have done little though I had
had people.

_22nd January, 1871._--A party is reported to be on the way hither. This
is likely enough, but reports are so often false that doubts arise.
Mohamad says he will give men when the party of Hassani comes, or when
Dugumbé arrives.

_24th January, 1871._--Mohamad mentioned this morning that Moene-mokaia,
and Moeneghera his brother, brought about thirty slaves from Katañga to
Ujiji, affected with swelled thyroid glands or "_Goître_," and that
drinking the water of Tanganyika proved a perfect cure to all in a very
few days. Sometimes the swelling went down in two days after they began
to use the water, in their ordinary way of cooking, washing, and
drinking: possibly some ingredient of the hot fountain that flows into
it affects the cure, for the people on the Lofubu, in Nsama's country,
had the swelling. The water in bays is decidedly brackish, while the
body of Tanganyika is quite fresh.

The odour of putrid elephant's meat in a house kills parrots: the
Manyuema keep it till quite rotten, but know its fatal effects on their
favourite birds.