_26th June, 1870._--Now my people failed me; so, with only three
attendants, Susi, Chuma, and Gardner, I started off to the north-west
for the Lualaba. The numbers of running rivulets to be crossed were
surprising, and at each, for some forty yards, the path had been worked
by the feet of passengers into adhesive mud: we crossed fourteen in one
day--some thigh deep; most of them run into the Liya, which we crossed,
and it flows to the Lualaba. We passed through many villages, for the
paths all lead through human dwellings. Many people presented bananas,
and seemed surprised when I made a small return gift; one man ran after
me with a sugar-cane; I paid for lodgings too: here the Arabs never do.

_28th June, 1870._--The driver ants were in millions in some part of
the way; on this side of the continent they seem less fierce than I have
found them in the west.

_29th June, 1870._--At one village musicians with calabashes, having
holes in them, flute-fashion, tried to please me by their vigorous
acting, and by beating drums in time.

_30th June, 1870._--We passed through the nine villages burned for a
single string of beads, and slept in the village of Malola.

_July, 1870._--While I was sleeping quietly here, some trading Arabs
camped at Nasangwa's, and at dead of night one was pinned to the earth
by a spear; no doubt this was in revenge for relations slain in the
forty mentioned: the survivors now wished to run a muck in all
directions against the Manyuema.

When I came up I proposed to ask the chief if he knew the assassin, and