to it since the 22nd July, or eighty days, by irritable ulcers on the
feet. The last twenty days I suffered from fever, which reduced my
strength, taking away my voice, and purging me. My appetite was good,
but the third mouthful of any food caused nausea and vomiting--purging
took place and profuse sweating; it was choleraic, and how many Manyuema
died of it we could not ascertain. While this epidemic raged here, we
heard of cholera terribly severe on the way to the coast. I am thankful
to feel myself well.

Only one ulcer is open, the size of a split pea: malachite was the
remedy most useful, but the beginning of the rains may have helped the
cure, as it does to others; copper rubbed down is used when malachite
cannot be had. We expect Syde bin Habib soon: he will take to the river,
and I hope so shall I. The native traders reached people who had horns
of oxen, got from the left bank of the Lualaba. Katomba's people got
most ivory, namely, fifty tusks; the others only four. The Metamba or
forest is of immense extent, and there is room for much ivory to be
picked up at five or seven bracelets of copper per tusk, if the slaves
sent will only be merciful. The nine villages destroyed, and 100 men
killed, by Katomba's slaves at Nasangwa's, were all about a string of
beads fastened to a powder horn, which a Manyuema man tried in vain to
steal!

Katomba gets twenty-five of the fifty tusks brought by his people. We
expect letters, and perhaps men by Syde bin Habib. No news from the
coast had come to Ujiji, save a rumour that some one was building a
large house at Bagamoio, but whether French or English no one can say:
possibly the erection of a huge establishment on the mainland may be a
way of laboriously proving that it is more healthy than the island. It
will take a long time to prove by stone and lime that the higher lands,